The executive director of the Kansas Board of Regents will be the next dean of Kansas University’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Kim Wilcox will return to KU, where he was a faculty member in speech, language and hearing from 1984 to 1998.

“I’m eager to get back on campus,” Wilcox said. “I really enjoyed what I’ve done (with the regents), but my heart is on campus.”

The college is the largest of KU’s 14 schools. It has more than 500 faculty members, almost 300 staff members and more than 15,000 students, or about 70 percent of KU’s undergraduate enrollment. It has an average budget of almost $90 million for its more than 50 departments.

Wilcox, 47, will start July 15. He said he expects the college to take an even higher profile in the upcoming years.

“I think the college has tremendous opportunities ahead of it in the next five to 10 years,” he said. “The nature of how the world is changing aligns perfectly with the college, and we’re ready to capitalize on that.”

That includes the emphasis of globalization that can be addressed by KU’s area studies centers and technology that can be addressed by the communications department, he said.

Wilcox, who has degrees from Michigan State University and Purdue University, came to KU as an assistant professor in 1984. He gradually worked his way to full professor in 1995.

He also served as chairman of the speech, language and hearing department from 1989 to 1998, when he became interim director of academic affairs for the regents. He was named executive director the next year.

He guided the regents through a restructuring of the state higher education system that placed community and technical colleges under regents control.

“Kim Wilcox has an extraordinary record as professor, researcher, mentor and administrator,” Provost David Shulenburger said. “He has been an effective advocate for all of higher education. I am confident that the application of his skills to the job of dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences will make an already strong college an even better place for students and faculty.”

Wilcox, who lives in Lawrence, will be paid $165,000 per year. According to KU officials, that’s the average pay for CLAS deans in the Big 12 and KU’s state-selected peer group. He currently makes $136,814 per year.

Other finalists for the position were Kip Hodges, a professor of geology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Ruth Maki, chair of psychology at Texas Tech University; and John Lipski, chair of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese at Pennsylvania State University.

Clay Blair, chairman of the Board of Regents, said regents hadn’t determined a process for replacing Wilcox. He said an interim director will be named by this summer.

“I think Kim was very responsible for helping to change the entire culture in leadership for the Board of Regents,” Blair said. “I think he will bring cutting-edge educational thinking to the liberal arts position because he’s an out-of-the-box thinker.”