The Provost’s Handbook: The Role of the Chief Academic Officer ed. by James Martin and James E. Samels

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Provost’s Handbook: The Role of the Chief Academic Officer ed. by James Martin and James E. Samels Kim Nehls James Martin and James E. Samels (Editors). The Provost’s Handbook: The Role of the Chief Academic Officer. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015. 248 pp. Paperback: $34.95. ISBN: 9781421416267. In a recent interview with Condoleezza Rice, she emphatically stated, “I’ve been National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, but Provost may have been the best job I ever had” (Rice, 2015, p. 6). According to her bio, Dr. Rice served as Provost of Stanford University from 1993–1999, where she was responsible for a $1.5 billion annual budget and an academic program involving 1,400 faculty members and 14,000 students. The position of Provost is typically seen as second-in-command to the president at a college or university. The Provost also is the chief academic officer (CAO) for an institution of higher education and may hold the title of Vice President or Vice Chancellor in addition to, or instead of, Provost. James Martin and James Samels have edited The Provost’s Handbook as a useful text on the role and responsibilities of a contemporary academic leader. The book is divided into two parts: Part 1 includes ten chapters on modern academic affairs, and Part 2 features seven chapters on essential partners for CAO’s. Each chapter was written by experts in the field; the majority of chapter authors served or are currently serving as Provosts. The chapter authors’ personal insights into the profession, along with situations from their own work, provided beneficial context to issues. For example, Chapter 8 was written by the former Provost, Lon Kaufman, [End Page 151] and Vice Provost, Saul Weiner, from University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). Their chapter focused on curriculum development, and it included their first-hand description of UIC’s strategic plan to reform its common curriculum. They were able to describe in detail the way in which their Provost’s office facilitated a series of meetings and developed a new model of core curriculum over the course of a decade-long process to improve course offerings at their institution. Interestingly, the UIC Provost featured in Chapter 8, Lon Kaufman, was recently demoted out of administration and back to a faculty role due to being embroiled in a FERPA lawsuit for publicly discussing a students’ dissertation and plagiarism charges (Associated Press, 2014). Provosts are not immune from challenges, like any administrator on a college campus. An entire chapter in Martin and Samels’ book was dedicated to lawsuits and working with campus legal counsel: Chapter 18 is titled “Keep Your Friends Close and College Counsel Closer: New Developments in Higher Education Law.” Perhaps Dr. Kaufman could have referred to this chapter, which encourages chief academic officers to partner “more closely with college counsel to address [issues] proactively before damage control is needed” (p. 189). The chapter also outlines a Disaster Management Plan, should one need to be implemented in case of a catastrophe on campus, an unfortunate but necessary precaution in the 21st century. This chapter, among the rest, highlights the need for a varied skillset among chief academic officers. In fact, when reading the top five “key skills necessary for CAO success” on page 15, an individual may think that he or she is reading the proficiencies necessary for an MBA or corporate executive, not an academic official. The five skills deemed essential for today’s Provosts are (1) general managerial ability, (2) interpersonal skills, (3) budget development experience, (4) strategic planning ability, and (5) accreditation and assessment management experience. What is not entirely clear from reading this book is the training ground for future academic leaders with these abilities. Certainly, many Provosts come from a prior role as a Dean, but with increasing frequency, Provosts are being hired from other academic administrative positions or from outside academia. Regardless of the background, the common administrative tasks for Provosts are faculty leadership, technology planning, and budget development. Therefore, the authors stated, “The pressures to spend greater time on these tasks create a mismatch between the expectations of some aspiring CAO’s and...