The Office of Student Affairs plans to create a new high level position to help assist in the responsibilities of current Vice President of Student Affairs Juan Gonzalez.
According to Gonzalez, the associate vice president for Student Affairs will perform as an “operations office, facilitating the smooth running of the Student Affairs Department.”
Since coming to Georgetown last year, Gonzalez said he has felt pressed in many directions and has not had enough time to communicate with students. He said he first expressed the desire to create a new position soon after he arrived.
“We want a person that helps me communicate in an organization that is sensitive to learning that takes place outside of the classroom,” Gonzalez said.
The Office of Student Affairs has organized a search committee which plans to begin reviewing applications in January. After interviewing select candidates, the committee will name three or four finalists by April 1, 2001. In April, the University community will have a chance to interview the finalists. Gonzalez will then hire an associate vice president from among the finalists.
Previous search committees, like those conducted for the vice president of Students Affairs and the University President, did not publicly announce the committee’s finalists.
Government Professor Anthony Arend will chair the search committee which will include representatives from Student Affairs, the Office of the President, the Athletic Department, the Jesuit Community, the faculty and students.
Although Gonzalez said that search is “completely wide open,” he said the candidates must have a minimum of eight years experience in higher education leadership in supervising student affairs.
The associate vice president will make more contact with graduate students, examine how to affect learning that takes place outside of class and spend a significant amount of time raising funds for Student Affairs, Gonzalez said. In addition to those responsibilities, the associate vice president will also supervise the MBNA Career Center, the Center for Minority Education Affairs, Counseling and Psychiatric Services, Health Education and the Office of Student Conduct.
Gonzalez will supervise the Athletic Department, the Department of Public Safety, the Department of Off Campus Student Affairs, the senior business manager of University Student Affairs, the Director of Residence Life and the associate vice president.
Three years ago, the University eliminated the position of assistant dean of students after the Assistant Dean, Penny Rue, left Georgetown. At the time, Dean of Students James Donahue said many of Rue’s responsibilities would be assumed by the dean of students and the others would be spread throughout Student Affairs.
When Donahue left Georgetown to become president of the Berkeley Theological Union in the summer of 2000, the University eliminated the position of dean of students and replaced it with a vice president of Student Affairs.
Lynne Hirschfeld, the senior business manager of University Student Affairs and a member of the search committee, said she has no idea how many applicants the University will receive. She said the new position will be beneficial to Student Affairs and is not an uncommon addition in many other universities.
University Provost Dorothy Brown’s office must approve the cost of new administrators. Brown said Gonzalez has proven the need for an associate vice president.
“Gonzalez [has] accepted responsibility for graduate students, for athletics, for the Alliance for Local Living and, in 2003, will have 780 additional resident students on campus in the Southwest Quadrangle,” Brown said.
