This week in the Governance Chambers of the Kent Student Center, the three final candidates for the dean of the College of Education, Health and Human Services gave their presentations to about 70 EHHS faculty, staff and administration members, students and the dean search committee.

According to faculty and staff, innovative, advocate, transparent, inclusive and strategic are all qualities they look for in their new dean.

Margaret Zoller Booth, Kenneth Teitelbaum and Alison Carr-Chellman were among the three finalists.

“The community, the college and the other deans are looking for someone they feel has personality, drive, energy and experience that they express and how well they express it is really what we look for when candidates come on campus,” said James Blank, dean of Arts and Sciences and the chair of the search committee.

Each presentation provided background information about each candidate, challenges facing higher education today and how he or she have faced these challenges and address any questions the audience had.

The presentations began Friday, Jan. 29 at 10:30 a.m. with Margaret Zoller Booth, associate dean for the graduate college of Bowling Green State University.

 “I have concentrated my career in higher education on high quality supported public institutions,” said Booth. “I truly believe that the future of higher education lies in the quality of public education.”

Kenneth Teitelbaum, a professor in the Department of Educational Leadership at University of North Carolina Wilmington, continued the presentations Monday, Feb. 1.

“Building positive relationships, I think that is really critical,” said Teitelbaum. “I hope that we could work together and see where our interests lie and advocate for each other.”

The series of presentations finished Tuesday, Feb. 2 with Alison Carr-Chellman, department head of Learning and Performance Systems of Pennsylvania State University’s College of Education.

“I have advocated for some specific academic enhancements and staffing enhancements through the upper administrations and have been very successful at making that happen because I positioned those pitches as a unique opportunity,” said Carr-Chellman. “So I think uniqueness is important.”

The selection process began in mid-October, and the interviewing process ended Tuesday after the last presentation. Anyone who attended the presentations was encouraged to fill out a candidate evaluation form to provide their input on each of the finalists by Wednesday Feb. 3 at 5 p.m.

“Everybody will submit all of their evaluations and the committee will meet together and then basically the search committee will submit a recommendation typically to the provost, and at that point he, whoever he decides to involve in the decision, will make an offer,” said Daniel Nilsson, Director of Academic Diversity Outreach. “Once somebody accepts, they most likely will start July 1.”

Alexandra Seibt is the EEHS reporter for The Kent Stater, contact her at [email protected]