In the search for a new provost and executive vice chancellor of academic affairs, UCCS is hosting three forums this week to let the campus get to know each candidate.
According to the job description posted on the CU Careers website, the provost and executive vice chancellor for academic affairs is the chief academic officer in charge of providing leadership and strategic direction for all academic programs and initiatives. The position is being paid an annual salary of $240,000 – $290,000.
The first forum was hosted on Nov. 11 with provost candidate and current Interim Provost Lynn Vidler and moderator Jevita Rogers, senior executive director of the Office of Financial Aid, Student Employment and Scholarships.
Vidler assumed the position of interim provost over the summer. They previously served for almost four years as the dean of the College of Letters, Arts & Sciences for UCCS.
Vidler has a PhD in Spanish from the University of California Irvine. As well as being a university administrator, Vidler is a scholar of Spanish literature with an emphasis on the staging practices of 17thcentury Spanish dramas. Vidler has recently shifted their research focus to higher education and leadership development.
Research is very important to Vidler, and they plan to prioritize enhancing UCCS’ standing as an R2 university, which means the campus has been classified to have high amounts of research activity.
In one of their first acts as interim provost, Vidler said they ensured that the Office of Research and the Office of Sponsored Programs and Research Integrity were fully staffed.
As the dean of the College of LAS, Vidler created an associate dean for research in the College of LAS. Vidler also helped supply research grants to faculty in the college, which contributed to the $18.9 million dollars LAS received in research funding last year. The funds put LAS above the College of Engineering in research funding for the first time in several years. Vidler hopes to bring these research practices that they implemented in LAS to the rest of the campus.
In their time as the interim provost, Vidler has been excited for the opportunity to work across divisions with the other Vice Chancellors on big picture questions. “As a dean for the past couple of years, I found myself trying to solve campus-level problems at the college level,” they said. “Sometimes, I feel like all I’ve been doing is cutting the budget.”
In their time as a dean, Vidler said that there have been five expense reductions, which taught them a lot about the budgetary process.
“I think we have, in the past, jumped to things like a budget model change or jumped to ideas like college mergers without necessarily doing the due diligence of the less sexy work … the smaller things to ensure that we have some curricular efficiencies,” Vidler said.
To maximize these curricular efficiencies, Vidler would like to ensure each college is offering an appropriate number of sections for each course and has appropriate course caps and fiscally sustainable course minimums. They added some colleges have been doing this already but want everyone to be doing it to save money.
Vidler also plans to prioritize fostering diversity, equity and inclusion as provost. To improve equity on campus, they plan to look at how policies impede, obstruct or facilitate equity across campus, particularly when it comes to policies that encourage diverse hiring practices.
The full forum is available on the UCCSLive YouTube channel. The search committee is accepting feedback forms for each candidate. The forms are due on Nov. 19 by 5 p.m. and will inform the committee’s decision.
The next forum for candidate Andrea Golato will be on Nov. 12 at 3:30 p.m. in UC 302 or via livestream. The final forum for candidate Lora Billings will be on Nov. 15 at 1 p.m. in UC 302 or via livestream.
This article is the first part of a series for the provost candidate forums. Click here for the next article.
From left to right, provost candidate Lynn Vidler and moderator Jevita Rogers. Photo by Tori Smith.