Faculty growth: 'A new sense of what is possible'

If expansion of the Brown faculty is a cornerstone of the University's Plan for Academic Enrichment, then faculty hiring would be an important barometer of progress. The news is good, according to Dean of the Faculty Rajiv Vohra.

After a decade of steady-state hiring, where arrivals and departures were roughly equal, the faculty has grown nearly 9 percent in the last three years. The George Street Journal talked with Vohra about "the new sense of what is possible."

GSJ: In your figures for the 1990s, you indicate a target of 613 faculty. Was that really a goal?

VOHRA: If all the searches had been successful, we would have reached that figure, but there never was an expectation of aggregate growth. We hired people, but about the same number of faculty retired or left the University - and many searches were unsuccessful.

GSJ: It looks as though the growth in faculty has taken place across the board.

VOHRA: All areas of the University will grow through the plan, but there are variations from year to year. There was always the understanding that we would make timing adjustments as we went along. We made more hires early on in the humanities, partly because we were without a facility like Ship Street. There is much yet to happen in the life sciences.

GSJ: There seemed to be a number of senior hires this year, more so than last.

VOHRA: We have hired more senior people in the initial phase because it was important to put senior leaders in place. They are the ones who will build some of the new interdisciplinary programs. Going forward, there will be a greater emphasis on the mix of junior and senior people.

GSJ: And now there is an expectation of growth on campus?

VOHRA: I would have to say that the attitude on campus is changing. We have hired top people from places where we hadn't hired successfully before. There is more confidence and a sense that we are aiming as high as possible. That can have an impact on how we grow. In the past, postponing a search was a cause for concern; the feeling was that an authorized position needed to be filled quickly and at all costs. Now there is a sense of taking more time, of being sure to hire exactly the person a department needs even if it means postponing the search for a year. That sense of confidence is very important.

GSJ: We are also having more success hiring women and minorities.

VOHRA: There is no question that having Brenda Allen and her office involved in searches has helped. She is Brown's first director of institutional diversity. Another important element is the target-of-opportunity hires. We are a small, tightly integrated institution, able to move quickly. When we have an opportunity to hire someone who is truly outstanding, we now have the resources and process to do so even if we hadn't planned a search. This has not always been well understood, however. Target-of-opportunity hires are not entirely unplanned. We are unlikely to pursue candidates in fields where growth is not anticipated. The target of opportunity process allows us to do something we were likely to do anyway, but to do it much sooner. It not only helps improve the diversity of our faculty; it helps us succeed in recruiting truly outstanding people.

GSJ: So things look good?

VOHRA: We are on the right track and yes, things have gone well. In five or 10 years, things will be even better than they are today. There is a new sense of what is possible, of what Brown can achieve. But there are challenges as well. We are running a very tight ship with not a lot of room for error. We will need to make difficult choices - but to me, the need to make difficult choices is almost the definition of an organization that is using its resources most effectively.