Dean, College of Health
Ball State University
Dean, College of Health
Ball State University and the College of Health seek a strategic, collaborative and community-minded leader to serve as its next dean. The incoming dean will have the opportunity to lead the college and serve as a member of an engaged and innovative academic leadership team as the University implements a new strategic plan and decentralized, incentive-based budget model.
Located in Muncie, Indiana, Ball State University serves approximately 22,000 graduate and undergraduate students across eight academic colleges with 190 undergraduate programs. Ball State offers more than 140 master’s, doctoral, certificate and specialist degrees, many of them ranking among the best in the nation. Originally founded to help boost the city’s development, Ball State has earned a Community Engagement Classification from the Carnegie Foundation, and serves as one of Indiana’s public research institutions while remaining committed to empowering our graduates to have fulfilling careers and meaningful lives enriched by lifelong learning and service.
At Ball State, diversity is an integral part of our identity. Our success depends on our efforts to cultivate inclusivity within our pedagogical, scholarly and creative pursuits. Community is an inherent and crucial aspect of such efforts at local, national and international levels. As we recruit and train a diverse administration, faculty/staff, and student body, we strive to ensure that our students are prepared to engage and succeed in increasingly diverse environments. Ball State will be a place recognized for its positive climate—one where all stakeholders know that their contributions to the mission of the university are essential to our success.
The new College of Health (COH) opened in Fall 2016, bringing together multiple health-related disciplines that leverage may of the institution’s distinguished and highly ranked programs in health and wellness. The college’s seven academic units include: counseling psychology, social psychology, and counseling; kinesiology; military science (ROTC); nursing; nutrition and health science; social work; and speech pathology and audiology. The College also includes 14 clinics, centers, and labs. In Fall 2019, the COH opened a new $62.5 million Health Professions building, bringing faculty, students, and staff together in a state-of-the-art learning environment that embraces an innovative, collaborative, and contemporary learning environment.
Reporting directly to the provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, the dean of the College of Health serves as the chief academic and administrator of the college. The dean is responsible for planning, directing and coordinating the operational, personnel, budgetary, fundraising and student activities of the college and providing leadership and direction in the development and implementation of curricula and academic programming. The dean is expected to foster interdisciplinary and interprofessional collaborations within the college, across campus, and in the community; promote open, transparent, and inclusive communication; and facilitate strategic planning and goal development across the academic departments and units in unison with the campus’s broader strategic plan, Destination 2040: Our Flight Path. The dean will serve as a visible and external advocate for the College, both on campus and within the local healthcare community, to sustain and deepen partnerships and generate new streams of revenue and health-related programs that support the teaching, research and service goals of the school. This is a unique opportunity for the next dean to make a major impact on the local healthcare needs of the region; join a strong academic leadership team at an institution in a relatively solid financial position compared to its peers; and to influence the next generation of healthcare professionals and leaders in the region and beyond.
The next dean should be an experienced leader with a deep understanding and knowledge of student recruitment, enrollment and retention, innovative programming and experiential learning, and faculty recruitment and development. The dean should be experienced in external resource generation through industry partnerships, alumni engagement, development and fundraising. The preferred candidate will have an advanced degree in the health professions or a relevant and related field as well as demonstrated successful experience in academic administration. Qualified applicants should have evidence of scholarly and professional achievement that merits a tenured faculty appointment at the rank of professor within the college.
All applications, nominations and inquiries are invited. Applications should include, as separate documents, a CV or resume and a letter of interest addressing the themes in this profile. Application materials should be submitted by November 23, 2020 using WittKieffer's candidate portal here.
Nominations and inquiries can be directed to consultants Zachary A. Smith, Ph.D. and Julia Venetos at BallStateCOHDean@wittkieffer.com.
Ball State University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer that is strongly and actively committed to diversity within its community. Women, minorities, individuals with disabilities, and protected veterans are strongly encouraged to apply. All qualified applicants will receive equal consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, protected veteran status, or any other legally protected status.