Princeton Weekly Bulletin September 13, 1998
Dean's job
includes faculty of the future
By Caroline Moseley
What inspires a dedicated scientist to leave classroom and laboratory and move to Nassau Hall? Joseph Taylor, James S. MacDonnell Distinguished University Professor of Physics and 1993 Nobel laureate, knows. He has just completed his first year as dean of the faculty.
"There are several reasons," Taylor says. "First, Harold Shapiro is a very persuasive man, one whom I admire a great deal and enjoy working with." Also compelling is Taylor's belief that "If you always say no when asked to take on new responsibilities and especially administrative ones you give up your right to complain if things aren't done as you might wish. And," he says with a smile, "I'd hate to give up my right to complain."
In addition, "It turns out, as I had hoped, that as dean I've had an opportunity to take part in a much broader spectrum of what goes on at Princeton, instead of being narrowly focused on my own research and teaching specialties. That has been a lot of fun and a fascinating change of pace."
Recruiting
The deanship of the faculty "revolves around all matters pertaining to the faculty and most particularly to defining and shaping the faculty of the future," Taylor explains. "Much of our work in this office has to do with faculty recruiting, a process that nearly always starts with departmental recommendations."
At the beginning of the academic year, he meets with each department chair. "We discuss whatever issues or problems may be current in the department; and, especially, we go over their faculty staffing needs. We talk about coming retirements. We talk about the department's nontenured faculty members: their development as scholars and teachers and their progress toward establishing a solid publication record and professional reputation."
And always, "We look for opportunities to address special needs and aspirations. For example, we'd like to further enhance the racial, ethnic, cultural and gender diversity of our very distinguished faculty."
He points with pride to "the notable success we had this year in recruiting women in several fields in which they've traditionally been underrepresented not just at Princeton, but nearly everywhere. We're fortunate this year to have attracted five superb women professors in the natural sciences, mathematics and engineering. I am very much looking forward to having them on our faculty."
These new colleagues, Taylor emphasizes, "are outstanding individuals who have been widely sought elsewhere as well. We are delighted that they help to address a gender imbalance in certain areas of our faculty, but they are not here on that account."
Committee of Three
Among Taylor's other duties is organizing the work of the Faculty Advisory Committee on Appointments and Advancements, generally known on campus as the Committee of Three. This committee, which is advisory to the president, makes final recommendations on all appointments and promotions at the tenure level.
"My office prepares the committee's agendas and assembles the final dossiers for candidates," Taylor says. "We write to a number of distinguished scholars in every candidate's field, asking for advice about the appointment. All responses to these letters go into the folders."
Through most of the academic year, "The committee meets twice a week, with the president presiding. The six elected faculty members on the committee put a huge amount of effort into this work. It is the principal mechanism by which we exercise quality control of our faculty, both present and future."
Academic Affairs
The dean of the faculty also serves as secretary to the Academic Affairs Committee, one of the standing committees of the board of trustees. "This is where the trustees interact most strongly with the academic aspects of the University," says Taylor. "The committee puts the final stamp of approval on all faculty appointments at the higher ranks."
This committee is always interested in new academic initiatives, he adds, citing as an example the introduction of a new one-year master of engineering degree in the School of Engineering and Applied Science. The committee is also concerned with "academic issues that affect the whole University, such as the study undertaken last year on our grading patterns over the past 20 years."
Another part of the job: "Because we have such a distinguished faculty, often they are the targets of recruiting efforts from other institutions. When this happens, we have to respond." It is Taylor's job "to persuade a valued colleague that Princeton is, in fact, the best place for him or her."
In addition, Taylor oversees "the annual salary and performance review process for nearly 2,000 people: the faculty, the professional research and technical staffs, and the library staff."
And of course, there's more. He serves on the Benefits Committee ("I represent the faculty's interests") and as secretary of the Faculty Advisory Committee on Policy, a body designed to provide advisory consultation on matters of University-wide policy that are of concern to the faculty.
New way of organizing time
A member of the Princeton faculty since 1980, Taylor observes that as dean he has had to get used to "a different set of responsibilities and wholly new way of organizing my time." Being dean requires "a tightly scheduled day, quite unlike that of a professor, who has classes to teach, students to advise, research to perform, papers or books to write, but who generally dictates much of his or her own working schedule."
Taylor believes it is important that Princeton's academic administrators have nearly always been faculty members though "it does mean that most of us who come into administration haven't had any particular training for it, nor have we spent much time doing the kinds of things that administrators must do." While "adjustments are necessary," the dean regards his densely inscribed desk calendar as "an extremely efficient way of interacting with a large number of people."
Vacation at Arecibo
While Taylor no longer has his principal office in Jadwin Hall, he hasn't left the physics building entirely. Work in his lab proceeds, he says, "actively pursuing studies of pulsars by radio-astronomical techniques." He generally spends at least part of one day each week with colleagues and students in the Physics Department, and his summer "vacation" included two weeks at his "favorite radio-telescope, the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, where I was once again an unencumbered and unscheduled scientist." He worked about 16 hours a day, but "it still felt like a vacation."
Reflecting on his first year as dean, Taylor says, "I didn't come into this office with an agenda of changes I wanted to make or a list of particular things I wanted to accomplish in a short time. I consider my principal task to be shaping and guarding the quality of the faculty over the next 10 or 20 years and beyond. This is the challenge that most concerns me."
In addition to what he now regards as his routine duties, in the coming year Taylor expects to be involved in "serious discussions of several new academic initiatives "including "a new center for the study of religion; a plan to attract outstanding new PhDs in the humanities, who would come to Princeton for several years of research and gain some teaching experience; and a genomics center that would involve research at the exciting boundaries between molecular biology, physics and chemistry."
He is also "looking forward to making fuller use of my one day a week in the Physics Department. After all, I'll no longer be learning a new job."