While the rest of the country was concerned with their final four picks for their fantasy basketball brackets, Winthrop was focused on its own final four picks. The search for the new provost and chief operating officer is coming to a close as the search committee, chaired by Sheila Burkhalter, vice president of student affairs, and Justin Oates, vice president of finance, narrowed down the candidates to four. The finalists are:
Dr. Melanie Hatch
Hatch is currently the associate provost at Albany State University in Albany, Georgia. She earned her Ph.D. in management science.
According to Hatch, the role of the provost is one for innovation, developing the faculty, staff, and academic affairs in a way that will benefit the university and advance the Winthrop Plan. In order to have this sort of innovation, Hatch hopes to implement an environment of intelligent risk taking.
“In order to create a climate of [risk taking], you’ve got to have a tolerance for failure, because again, not everything works. If you are willing to try something and you want your people to try something, then you better not be punitive if it doesn’t work out,” Hatch said.
Hatch concluded her visit on March 19.
“I came here ready to be impressed and I have been. I felt that [Winthrop] has a sense of purpose. You have a vision. Your president has a vision. You want to support that. You know where you’re going; you’ve got metrics to support that on how to get that. I really see a sense of purpose here at the institution,” Hatch said.
Dr. Jie Chen
Chen is currently the dean of the graduate school of James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. He earned his Ph.D. in political science.
His goal for the provost is turning challenges into opportunities. At Winthrop, he identified challenges in enrollment, student retention and innovation and technology. Transforming these challenges into opportunities would involve looking at the challenge on a national level and then targeting the solution towards Winthrop.
Chen concluded his visit on March 26.
“I believe that this is a good opportunity, a good university, institution to be with for several reasons. First of all, this university, to be honest, ranks pretty decently…also you have pretty good teacher-student ratio. I really value direct interaction with the student. I believe that this is one of the most important values of higher education in this country. You really care for students, for future students well-being and you have a very close category of frequent interaction of students,” Chen said.
Dr. Adrienne McCormick
McCormick joined Winthrop as the dean of the college of arts and sciences in 2018. She earned her Ph.D. in literature in English.
If she were to gain the position as provost, she would work to further the Winthrop Plan through implementing “next-generation advising practices,” advancing online programming and professional development for faculty.
McCormick sees her style of leadership as service-based and feels this will benefit her in the role of Provost.
“The main call to leadership for me is to lead to serve, to be in service to others, and also to create an environment where those that I work with also have the ability to improve in their service, to be motivational and to always practice shared governance and sharing in that decision making process,” McCormick said.
Dr. Robert “Bud” Fischer
Fischer is currently the dean and a professor of college of basic and applied sciences at Middle Tennessee State University. He earned his Ph.D in evolutionary biology.
He said the role of the provost is learning to balance the duties of being both the chief academic officer and the chief operating officer in working to find ways to advance the Winthrop plan that are efficient and feasible for the university.
“In this day and age of ever changing times in higher education, you are going to have to figure out how to be in the room, having conversations and creating groups and creating relationships with all constituents across the campus to be able to come to some conclusions. On the other side of the coin, which is the COO, what you’re going to have to do is put everybody together to really handle some of the other difficult problems that are associated with universities in these ever changing times,” Fischer said.
Fischer concluded his visit on March 29.
“Winthrop has a bunch of commitments that I believe in. A couple of them being: I believe in diversity, accessibility and affordability. I believe that [Winthrop] has a commitment to academic quality, and I do too. I believe that you have a commitment to the teacher-scholar model. Lastly, I think you have a commitment to being part of this community and this greater area,” Fischer said.
