The Iowa State Office of the Senior Vice President and Provost recently announced its decision to continue the search for the next dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine.

After completing a three-candidate open forum cycle consisting of Spencer Johnston of the University of Georgia, Daniel Grooms of Michigan State University and Patrick Halbur of Iowa State, the college believes it has not yet met its match for the next dean and will continue looking.

The internal and external committee members have been led by the two co-chairs of the search committee, Beate Schmittmann, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Ann Marie VanDerZanden, associate provost for academic programs.

The process of searching for a dean began at Iowa State, where the initial position description was established.

“In order to establish that [position description] we did a lot of meetings with faculty, staff and other groups to get feedback on the skills, abilities and characteristics they are looking for in the next dean,” VanDerZanden said. “We used that information to build the description of what we were looking for.”

Iowa State then shared that information with an executive search firm called Parker Executive Search (PES).

According to PES’ website, they have “a national and international client base including top intercollegiate athletics programs and sports businesses, leading colleges and universities, Fortune 500 corporations, privately held startups, nationally-recognized academic health science centers, hospitals/health systems and best-in-class not-for profits.”

The purpose of utilizing an executive search committee for a dean position is to gain assistance in the search process. PES provides clients with assessments of candidate qualifications, original research, advertising assistance and access to contacts across the nation.

PES’ website states their “higher education search practice is one of the most highly regarded in the country, providing services to both public and private colleges and universities to aggressively recruit academic leaders.”

VanDerZanden said PES did a lot of advertising across the nation on behalf of Iowa State, and reached out to a variety of individuals on a national level to assist with the search process.

This search process has been different for VanDerZanden due to the complexity of this particular college.

“The vet med college is a large organization, and quite a complex organization because of the role they have in training students, the work they do in the diagnostic hospital and in the large animal medicine department,” VanDerZanden said. “It’s a very large, very complicated organization as a whole.”

With that being said, a large requirement the college will look for as they continue to search for the next dean is a record of significant leadership experience that shows the candidate is qualified to tackle such a large vessel.

Another unique thing about this particular process is that vet med students have been involved in all campus visits with the first three candidates, providing them with an opportunity to meet the candidate and show them the college from their perspective.

“Usually, we have a student representative on executive positions involved [in search processes],” VanDerZanden said. “I think in this case, the college is such a large and complicated organization that having students interact with them [the candidates] was very beneficial. I think it’s one thing to interview a faculty or staff member, but it’s much different when you are able to speak with a student.”

Abbey Smith, veterinary medicine student and president of the Student American Veterinary Medical Association thinks Vet Med is in good hands as the search continues on.

“I know that President Wintersteen and Provost Wickert are making decisions based on what they think is best for the school and many factors were taken into consideration to make their decision to continue the search for a CVM dean,” Smith said.

According to the Iowa State College of Veterinary Medicine’s website, “additional updates, including a new timeline, will be available in the coming weeks.”

Halbur will continue to serve as the college’s interim dean until a permanent dean is selected.