Bad News for the Business School

It seems the front page of every paper these days is dominated by business stories. Business, and more specifically the economy, is the news for the time being. Editors and journalists have to keep these stories fresh and interesting. So while the headline of this week's issue of The Ithacan, "Beat the Recession" did not grab my attention, the right-hand column did.

"Dean Accepts Offer for New Employment."

We've seen stories like this before, most notably in 2007 when Dean of the Business School Susan Engelkemeyer decided she would in fact stay at Ithaca, despite being in selection pools at two other schools.

This time she's leaving for good, heading for UMass Dartmouth. The Ithacan reported:

Engelkemeyer said she will leave to take a deanship at a larger institution with more majors and students. She said the new position will allow her to be closer to her family in Massachusetts.

Those motives seem pure enough, and indeed, Engelkemeyer has done much for the business school in her four years. The Ithaca Journal reports (and by reports, I mean took the press release and added a sentence at the top):

Under Engelkemeyer's leadership, the Ithaca College School of Business earned initial accreditation by The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, attained a 17-year high in undergraduate first-year student enrollment and an all-time high in MBA enrollment and has been included in the "Best 290 Business Schools," published by Princeton Review.

I know from students I've talked with that she did a heck of a lot of fund raising. And we all know her greatest accomplishment, the business school's transition into the Dorothy D. and Roy H. Park Center for Business and Sustainable Enterprise (the only sustainable building I have ever seen to use flat screen TVs as menus).

However, I get the feeling she's sort of leaving the business school in the lurch. The business school right now is still searching for an assistant dean to fill the shoes of Meg Nowak, who left in Novenmber 2007. She was the replacement for Hugh Rowland, who left in 2005. Professor Hormoz Movassaghi has been in and out of the temporary associate dean position, filling in wherever needed, since Rowland left.

Now the school must search for a head dean as well, a no-doubt laborious process. But there's no word of that in the article, no fears from students or staff that the school now essentially lacks both deans. Nothing on the changing times and doubt and what this means for the future of the business school. The Ithacan article only focuses on the positives; the only negative quote is quickly twisted positive:

Jeff Lippitt, associate professor and chair of the accounting department, said Engelkemeyer has been good for the school but losing a dean is never easy.

“It always creates uncertainty when a dean leaves,” he said. “But it also [creates] the possibility for a new start and a new direction.”

I do not know enough about the inner-workings of the business school to comment on whether that new direction would be good or bad, but I do know this: there are business majors out there who are concerned. Parkies will remember the terror and anger when Park School Dean Dianne Lynch briefly decided to head to Berkeley before determining it would be better to stay.

I imagine it's a fear like that. But unlike Park, the School of Business will not be getting its dean back.