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| FSU Professor Emmanuel Collins and FSU Professor Bruce Locke |
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| Selection process for FAMU-FSU College of Engineering dean since 1987 |
“Arresting the decline in FAMU’s student body means hiring
new faculty, which is an important factor in attracting students. The dean has
the responsibility of approving vacant and new line items. Gaining the
responsibility of selecting the dean will help to address this issue,” a FAMU
press release said.
But “gaining the responsibility of selecting the dean” isn’t
what happened at FAMU.
The rules for appointing deans at the COE were set in a 1987 agreement. It says that: “The presidents shall appoint the dean on the advice of the Joint Management Council based on the recommendations of a faculty search committee composed of an equal number of faculty members from the two universities.” Those rules are still in place and FAMU cannot appoint a COE dean all by itself.
Mangum and FSU President John Thrasher agreed to jointly
appoint then-FSU Associate Provost Bruce Locke as the interim COE dean in 2015.
FAMU will be the tenure home for the new dean. But that
individual must still be jointly appointed by the presidents of FAMU and FSU.
Locke, who is a professor with tenure at FSU, is now a
finalist for the permanent COE deanship. If Thrasher wants Locke to become
permanent dean and Mangum says “no,” then Locke will just stay on in the
interim deanship on an indefinite basis.
Mangum still hasn't explained why an engineering professor
with tenure at FAMU wasn't chosen for the interim deanship even though the
university has a number of faculty members who are fully qualified for the job.
Thrasher needed Mangum’s agreement for Locke to be jointly appointed as the
interim dean.
If Mangum didn’t want a current FAMU professor to step in as
interim dean, then she could have refused to jointly appoint an FSU professor
to the job until Thrasher agreed to set a limit on that individual’s time in
the position and start a national search for an interim dean who would be hired
on a FAMU line. But Mangum just let Thrasher have the interim deanship without
asking for any of those things.
FSU Mechanical Engineering Professor Emmanuel Collins is
also a finalist for the permanent deanship. Anyone who thinks that Collins
or Locke will suddenly become a strong advocate for FAMU in the permanent COE
deanship is chasing a pipe dream.
If Collins or Locke becomes the permanent dean, you can bet
that FSU will let that professor keep his tenured appointment at FSU. That will
keep the door open for that individual to return to the FSU faculty after the
deanship. A COE dean who wants to eventually return to FSU won’t make any decisions that
go against what Thrasher wants.
Thrasher has used a smart strategy to guarantee that he
comes out as the winner in the selection process for the new COE dean.