Interim Leadership of the School of the Arts and Architecture and Herb Alpert School of Music

UCLA Office of the Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost

To: Faculty in the School of the Arts and Architecture and Musicology

Dear Colleagues,

As you know Dean Christopher Waterman will be stepping down at the end of the academic year following over ten years of distinguished leadership. Daniel Neuman, interim director of the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music for the past two years will also step down at that time and return full-time to scholarship and teaching.

Although we have made excellent progress toward establishing the Herb Alpert School of Music and redefining the School of the Arts and Architecture, the process will continue into the 2015-16 academic year. As a result, the Chancellor and I will appoint an interim dean of the School of the Arts and Architecture and a director of the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music. Both appointments will be effective July 1 2015. Once the proposals are approved, the director will become the interim dean of the newly established School of Music, and we will launch national searches for permanent deans.

Our goal during this transitional period is to build the administrative capacity of both schools. Most likely, the interim dean of SOAA will be selected from among the four departments in the proposed School, while the director will be selected from among the three departments proposed for the new School of Music. Both positions will report directly to me, and they will share the responsibilities of making all of the transitions recommended in the two proposals now under review by the Academic Senate.

The director of the Herb Alpert School of Music will hold most of the responsibilities that ordinarily rest with deans, such as development, communications, budget, staffing, and establishing committees and programs to further the mission of the school. Until the School of Music is formally established, however, the interim dean of SOAA must carry responsibility for academic personnel actions in Ethnomusicology and Music; the dean of the division of Humanities must continue to have responsibility for academic personnel actions in Musicology. The director will review all such cases and consult with the deans; if a faculty member under review so requests, the director will provide written evaluations.

At this time, I invite your input about both the interim dean of SOAA and the director of the School of Music. We seek leaders who will work as a team to facilitate change while also overseeing and facilitating the ongoing activities of the academic departments and development.

Please email your recommendations or other input to me at evc@conet.ucla.edu no later than Friday, February 20, 2015. I will ask the relevant department chairs and the faculty representatives who served on the two proposal workgroups to review your suggestions and nominations and make recommendations to me. I hope to announce these appointments early in the spring quarter. Thank you for sharing your suggestions.

Sincerely,

Scott L. Waugh
Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost