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The Rice Thresher
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by BEN WESTON THRESHER EDITORIAL STAFF Eugene Levy, dean of the College of Science at the University of Arizona, will take office as provost July 1, President Malcolm Gillis announced yesterday. Levy will replace Interim Provost David Minter, who has held the position since former Provost David Auston left last July to become president of Case Western Reserve University. Auston had held the position since 1993. "I have a lot of confidence in [Levy]," Minter, an English professor, said. "He comes very highly recommended, and he was appointed as the result of a very aggressive search for outstanding candidates from a very strong pool of candidates. I think he's first-rate." Levy was selected after a nine-month search by a committee led by History Professor Gale Stokes. "The search for such a position is quite a lengthy and involved process," Stokes said. Stokes explained that the committee first hired a professional search team to assemble a list of candidates. From this list of roughly 160 people, Stokes said around 50 were serious candidates. The committee chose about a dozen out of this group and interviewed them on campus. After this process, the Provost Search Committee submitted a final list of the four best candidates to Gillis about three months ago. "To be a provost at Rice, you've got to be a first-class scholar," Gillis said. "Then you start looking for these other traits: vision, managerial ability, ability to get people to do their best work, strong academic values [and] a willingness to consider change." Gillis received unanimous approval from the Board of Trustees for his choice of Levy early this week. "The things that impressed me most about [Levy] in the interview were his rigorous advocacy of the academic side of the university, his understanding of the kinds of problems that we face, and also equally important, a vision for the future that fit in with our plans," Minter said. "An emphasis that we're looking at perhaps in the next few years is to increase the research capacity and reputation of the university. I think he brings a vision in that area that is going to be very powerful," he said. The provost is the chief academic officer of the university and is responsible for all academic problems. The dean of each school reports directly to him, and on academic matters, the provost is under the authority of only the president. Minter said Levy will probably experience a relatively easy transition into the office. "Rice is not a school with a lot of unresolved problems and crises," Minter said. "It's not at all like that. He's not going to be having to put out a lot of fires." "I approach jobs like this with the sense that I'd like to have a very big impact," Levy said. "The first focus is going to be on identifying and understanding, as deeply as I can, the existing strengths and opportunities, and then to build on that." Gillis said he has high hopes for Levy's tenure. Though he said he expects Levy to hold the position for significantly longer than five years, he used the figure as a point of reference. "In several fields ... we intend to have programs that rank among the top five in the world," Gillis said. "And I would hope that by the end of five years we will have moved a long way in that direction. And you have to have a good provost to do that." Levy said one of his top priorities will be utilizing the talents and ideas of the faculty. "What you have to do is facilitate and lead creative people," he said. "A university ... lives or dies, thrives or survives on the basis of the creative potential of its faculty." "I think the size of the university is a challenge to some of the aspirations," Levy said. "Rice's range of disciplines and fields of academic endeavor is necessarily constrained with the faculty. ... [But] I am really more concerned about the quality than the size of the university." Levy did his undergraduate studies at Rutgers University and earned his doctorate in physics in 1971 at the University of Chicago. He joined the Arizona faculty in 1975 and was awarded tenure in 1978. By 1983, Levy was promoted to full professor and was named the head of the Planetary Science Department as well as director of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory the same year. In 1993, he became the dean of the College of Science. - back -
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