The search committee at Florida A&M’s College of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical sciences held a meeting Wednesday night for students and faculty about selecting the next dean for the school.
The meeting was held in the New Pharmacy Building with a few students and members of the committee there to inform the stakeholders about how the search was going and to share what they are looking for in the next dean.
The previous dean, Michael Thompson, was appointed in 2012 but was removed from his position last May along with three other deans at FAMU.
The search committee met three times during the fall semester last year and now has hired the Greenwood/Asher firm to help conduct the search for a new dean.
Reginald Perry, Associate Dean for Student Affairs and Curriculum at the FAMU/FSU College of Engineering, led the meeting. Perry is also one of the 17 members of the search committee.
After discussing the values that the dean should have and the progress of the search, a question was asked to all the stakeholders that were there.
“What are some of the strengths of the college that we could use to entice someone to become the next dean?” Perry asked.
Fran Close, a professor at the college, gave her input on what she believes are some of the strengths of the college.
“We have a Public Health department and not many schools have that. So we’re able to do translational research, health disparities research where we’re taking things from the bench to the community and you don’t always get to do that in most places,” Close said.
“We have a faculty and staff that are here because of the love for the college and for the students,” Patty Ghazvini, professor and Division Director of Pharmacy Practice Division, said.
The students at the meeting also gave their input on what they believe the dean should do to make their college better.
“I think traditionally, we have had a very strong pharmacy practice training and development in students,” Said Asha Rizor, a second year doctoral student and pharmaceutical scientist. “It’s also important to have a dean who understands the importance of research and can keep our university as the number one producer of African Americans with PhDs in pharmaceutical sciences and also a Carnegie research institution.”.
Many of the stakeholders there believe that the meeting helped them realize that there is a disconnect between the students, faculty and the staff. And with that kind of problems being an issue, many believe that the next dean should have strong leaderships skills and a vision to bring the school together.
“The main thing that we got here tonight is that we want a person that has a vision for the college so that we can go to the next level. We want to be number one but we need that guidance from the top to take us there,” Close said.
At the end of the meeting, Perry said he was satisfied about how the meeting went.
“I thought the meeting tonight was very effective. The ideal is to get feedback from the various stakeholders within the College of Pharmacy to understand what their feelings are with respect to what qualities they want to see in the next dean,” Perry said.
The committee plans to have the next Town Hall meeting in February and hopes to have a new dean appointed by July of 2018.