Chancellor appoints panel in search for new dean

Chancellor John D. Wiley has appointed a search-and-screen committee to help in identifying a successor to Phillip R. Certain, dean of the College of Letters and Science, who has announced his decision to retire on June 30.

The 17-member committee will seek nominations, recruit applicants, select finalists and submit those names to Wiley for consideration. The panel will be led by John Schaffer, professor and director of the School of Music.

Other committee members include Sandra Arfa, faculty associate in English; James Burgess, member of the L&S Board of Visitors; Judith Burstyn, chemistry professor; Mary Czynszak-Lyne, program assistant in the L&S Honors Program; Richard Davidson, psychology professor; John T. Koehler, undergraduate student; Robert B. Miller, business and statistics professor; Charles Read, School of Education dean; Tori Richardson, assistant dean of L&S Student Academic Affairs; Marsha Seltzer, social work professor; Thomas Sharkey, botany professor; Aliko Songolo, African languages and literature, and French and Italian professor; Karen Steudel, zoology professor; Barbara Wolfe, economics and population health studies professor; Deborah Zurbuchen, human resources assistant in the medical school; and a graduate student yet to be named.

Certain’s career includes 34 years at the university, including his 11-year stint as dean of the campus’s largest academic unit. The college enrolls more than half of all UW–Madison students in its 39 departments and five professional schools.