The Provost Search Committee, which formed in December, held two listening sessions over Zoom last week where several attendees said they’d like to see a new provost with a non-academic or political background and the ability to collaborate across NYU’s departments. Each meeting saw an attendance of around 40 people — most of whom were faculty members.

The search committee is accepting provost applications and nominations throughout this week and plans to begin interviews before the end of the month. Michael Purugganan, the chair of the search committee and a professor at the College of Arts & Science, said at the Feb. 2 session that the committee hopes to suggest candidates to President Linda Mills by the end of the spring semester.

“When I think about someone outside of NYU coming home, I get apprehensive because our institution is so complex and layered,” Jordana Mendelson, an associate professor in the department of Spanish and Portuguese and the director of the King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center, said at the Feb. 2 session. “You can’t have someone who comes not knowing how NYU has evolved or has their preconceived idea of what NYU is — there has to be some connection.”

Individuals can either apply for the provost position or nominate someone else, according to the website of Isaacson, Miller — the search firm helping in the search process. The firm will then select three final candidates for Mills to consider. NYU also used the search firm to appoint former university president Andrew Hamilton in 2016 and Mills last year. 

The provost acts as the university’s chief academic officer and helps oversee all academic departments. They are also responsible for supervising deans and program directors, as well as helping to manage the allocation of financial resources to individual academic programs. 

In August 2022, Hamilton appointed Georgina Dopico as interim provost after Katherine Fleming, the university’s last provost, left NYU to take over as president and CEO at J. Paul Getty Trust. Purugganan said that he could not comment on specific candidates, such as whether Dopico is being considered for the new position.

Past engagement sessions for students and faculty to give input on the hiring of high-ranking university leaders have seen lower attendance than the sessions held last week. In 2022, during the search for Hamilton’s successor, only one student attended a listening session. Attendance was also low at engagement meetings during the search for a new dean of the Tandon School of Engineering. The current dean, Jelena Kovačević, announced she would be stepping down from the role in August 2024. Kovačević’s successor has yet to be announced. 

Mendelson, along with several other faculty members at the listening sessions, said the provost should be someone familiar with NYU, adding that the school’s reputation is vastly different from its reality.

“For faculty, for me in particular, the provost becomes our North Star,” Mendelson said. “In many ways, whether we want them to be or not, they really set the academic priorities here at NYU.”

Correction, Feb. 5: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated the school at which Michael Purugganan is a professor and incorrectly stated who would consider the three finalists for the provost position. The article has been corrected, and WSN regrets the errors.

Contact Sidney Snider at [email protected].