Wade Hobgood, a professor of mass communications at North Carolina-Asheville, was in Lawrence last week interviewing for the job as dean of the Kansas University School of Fine Arts. William May, dean of the Baylor University School of Music, was in Lawrence earlier this week being interviewed for the job, and Aaron Horne, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Winston-Salem University, was the last of the three finalists to visit KU.

The position opened up when Dean Steve Hedden announced last year that he would leave the deanship at the end of the current school year. Hedden has served as dean since 2003.

Selecting a dean for the School of Fine Arts is a terribly important responsibility. It’s an important task whether it’s for a dean for the School of Fine Arts or for a dean at any other school within the university family. Deans can and do make a tremendous difference in the excellence of a university. The vision, leadership, ability to raise money and make friends for the school all are important. Likewise, it is essential for a dean to have a good relationship with the chancellor of the university and, in KU’s case, the provost.

Deans are not changed or resign every day, so when there is an opportunity to hire a dean, every effort should be made to seek the very best individuals to move into those jobs.

This raises the question of whether KU is doing everything it can to get a truly superior dean.

First of all, KU is handicapped by its policy of making the names of applicants, at least the finalists, public. What top-flight individual wants his or her current employer to know he or she is applying for a job elsewhere? KU’s policy is sure to have discouraged many excellent candidates this year, as well as in the past when the university was looking for deans, provosts or a chancellor.

This being the case, what will be the university’s policy when it comes time to find a replacement for Chancellor Robert Hemenway or Provost Richard Lariviere?

According to a current sitting chancellor at one of this nation’s most prestigious schools, the KU policy is “dumb” and damaging, and is sure to keep KU from attracting the truly superior candidates. This is a sad situation for the schools, its faculty, students and the state.

Getting back to the current KU dean’s search, several knowledgeable academic leaders told this writer it is important to get the best possible dean for a number of reasons, one of which is the importance of a “strong program in the arts.” They said such a program is “important to students as well as the rest of the university community.” They added that, at a time when there is so much emphasis on engineering and science, it is particularly important for the arts to have a strong presence on the campus and partner in development of the total human being. A strong dean is necessary to help create this climate on and off the campus and to explain and demonstrate the vital role the arts play in our society.

How does KU go about attracting and landing a superior dean or provost or chancellor?

KU’s current process is to appoint a search committee to review candidates for the job. It’s likely this group is selected by the provost, maybe with the advice of others.

It is possible, but hopefully not the case at KU, that whoever puts together the search committee could load it with individuals who are likely to favor one kind of candidate over another. Whatever the case, the selection committee screens the candidates.

Candidates can learn about the opening through ads in academic papers and magazines. It’s likely some learn about the situation from friends or acquaintances on the campus, and there are probably some who are contacted by KU officials to see whether they would be interested in the job.

As one sitting university chancellor in another state said, “The first thing I do when visiting with those on a selection committee is to tell them they are not to screen, but rather they are to go out, search for and recruit individuals who would add excellence and leadership to the campus. You don’t want just a group of candidates who are unhappy with their current jobs and decide to toss their hats into the ring for the KU job.” If the names of candidates are to be public, KU is assuming a huge handicap in attracting the best.

Just how much “searching” and recruiting has been done by members of the School of Fine Arts search committee for a new dean?

Compare the dean selection process to the process of finding a new football or basketball coach. Every effort is made to seek the best, most promising or successful coach. Super deals are offered in the way of salaries, cars, club memberships, benefits, extras and promises, such as a new football office and training center, a new basketball practice facility, etc.

Secret meetings are held at undisclosed locations such as at an airport in some distant city where KU representatives meet with a candidate so no one will know who is being recruited. It’s a major, secret campaign that far surpasses the effort KU makes in selecting deans.

Aren’t deans, provosts and chancellors just as important as a coach, and shouldn’t similar efforts be made to get the very best in the academic leadership of the university, as is done to get the best coaches?

It’s admirable that university officials want to operate in the open and not behind closed doors, but why shouldn’t the rules of recruitment be the same for athletic and academic positions? Some will say the athletic department is separate from the university, but if the chancellor were to say all search programs would be conducted in the same manner, it would be done.

KU should be working to find the very best, offering attractive salaries and benefits and all the other goodies promised to coaches, maybe a new building, a lot of new equipment, added faculty members and a pay hike for all those in the fine arts school.

Will KU get the very best, a true “all-star,” for its dean of the School of Fine Arts? Will it have set the qualifications bar higher than just at the “average” or “mediocre” level?

It is hoped one of the three finalists for the KU deanship will be a tremendous addition to the university, but if there are questions and serious reservations about the candidates within the search committee, its members should have the courage to tell the provost or chancellor that none of the three measures up and that a new search process should be started.

This is why the process should be conducted privately, because it is embarrassing to any candidate to be rejected in a public manner.

KU deserves to get the best in its deans, as well as the administrative offices, just as they try to do in the athletic department.