UTD President Prabhas Moghe sent out a schoolwide email this afternoon stating UTD is looking for the next vice president for academic affairs and provost.
Inga Musselman has served as UTD’s provost since 2017. The provost is the head of academics on campus and one of the most influential members of UTD’s administration. The role oversees all the deans on campus, including both deans of individual schools like JSOM and non-school roles like library dean, and as part of the president’s cabinet, the provost is the second-highest authority when it comes to academic decisions like hiring, research, degree programs and scholastic integrity.
Inga Musselman has served as UTD’s provost since 2017. As the head of academics on campus, the provost serves as one of the most influential members of UTD’s administration. The provost oversees all the deans on campus, including both deans of individual schools like JSOM and non-school roles like library dean. As part of the president’s cabinet, the provost is the second-highest authority when it comes to academic decisions like hiring, research, degree programs and academic integrity.
According to today’s email, the search process will include involvement from students, staff and faculty. Feedback and comments may be confidentially submitted through the university’s leadership search website’s feedback form. Nominations and applications for the role may be submitted by emailing WittKiefer, a company specialized in “executive search & advisory solutions” that Moghe said UTD is collaborating with throughout the search process.
The website lays out a search process timeline, which says the application window opens in November, interviews with candidates are conducted through December and January and finalists are selected throughout February and March.
This change comes as part of a series of replacements of high-level administrators, including presidents, across the UT System over the last two years, including UTD’s own presidential search earlier this year. Moghe officially began his term as UTD’s sixth president Aug. 2, succeeding Richard Benson after a nine-month search process following Benson’s announced resignation. The presidential search process involved creating a Presidential Search Advisory Committee which collected feedback from the UTD community and sent its nominations to the UT System Board of Regents, who ultimately decided on the successor.
A search committee to guide selecting Musselman’s successor has been established as well, according to the search website. The committee consists of JSOM dean Hasan Pirkul; Student Government President and neuroscience/psychology double major Giana Abraham; neuroscience department head Gregory Dussor; EPPS dean Jennifer Holmes; physics professor and final Speaker of the Academic Senate Michael Kesden; computer science professor Sriraam Natarajan; vice president for research and innovation Joseph Pancrazio; Graduate Student Assembly president and computer science student Devarsh Pathak; Dean of Students Amanda Smith; Edith O’Donnell Institute of Art History director Michael Thomas; vice president for budget and finance Orkun Toros; and materials science professor Walter Voit.
The committee’s demographics break down into two students — one undergraduate and one graduate — as well as three representatives from ECS, two from BBS, one from JSOM, one from BAHT, one from EPPS, one from NSM and none from Interdisciplinary Studies. Unlike the search committee for the president, all 12 provost search committee members are students or employees of UTD. It is currently unclear whether the committee will report to the Board of Regents or make the hiring decision independently.
Musselman will retain her position until a successor is selected. It is currently unclear whether she will remain at UTD after her successor is chosen; the resignation and search initiation email Benson sent out in August last year explicitly stated he would remain at UTD as a faculty member after stepping down. Musselman has been at UTD since 1992 as a professor of chemistry.
The Retrograde has reached out to the president’s and provost’s offices for comment. As of publication, neither has responded. Per Moghe’s email, more information will be released “periodically” through the search website.
This is a breaking news story. The Retrograde will provide more details as new information emerges.