The second finalist in the University of Arizonaβs provost search, Marie Hardin, visits campus this week for her final interview.
Hardin, whose academic expertise focuses on issues of diversity, ethics and professionalism in sports journalism, currently serves as dean of the Bellisario College of Communications at Pennsylvania State University. She has been leader of the college, the largest accredited mass communications program in the country, since 2014.
Her experience at Penn State, which in 2023 announced it was dealing with a $140 million deficit, might be helpful in leading academic units amid UAβs own $177 million deficit.
According to the Penn State Collegian, the universityβs student newspaper, Hardinβs communication with the College of Communications was appreciated by its faculty members. One professor told the student newspaper that updates from Hardin were βvery transparentβ about the decisions being made amid the universityβs deficit.
Hardin will be presenting and answering questions in an open forum at UA on Tuesday, April 2, in Room 100 of the Social Sciences building from 2:30-3:30 p.m.
After Hardin, the third candidate for provost will visit campus next week. A UA spokeswoman would not release the third candidateβs name.
The first finalist, Fouad Abd-El-Khalick, dean of the School of Education at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill since 2016, was at UA last week for his final interview.
Hardin received her bachelorβs degree from Ambassador University and her Ph.D. from the University of Georgia. She taught at Florida Southern College and the State University of West Georgia before arriving at Penn State as a professor in 2003.
After becoming dean in 2014, she led the collegeβs renaming and rebranding in 2017 after securing a $30 million gift from Donald P. Bellisario, and Penn State committed an additional $45 million for a new media center proposed by Hardin, which opened in 2020.
The college offers some of the largest majors at the university, and its four-year graduation rate is one of the highest at Penn State.
According to the university, since Hardin became dean, the collegeβs revenues generated through online degree programs have more than tripled, and its annual research expenditures have increased more than four-fold. Additionally, it is one of just a few units at Penn State to surpass its fundraising goal twice during the universityβs most recent fundraising campaign.
Hardin has twice been elected to lead Penn Stateβs Academic Leadership Council, which represents all deans and chancellors systemwide. She led a committee that designed the universityβs COVID-19 classroom response rate and was one of two deans asked to help redesign Penn Stateβs budget allocation model for all academic units, set to be implemented this year.
Ellie Wolfe is the Higher Education reporter at the Arizona Daily Star. New to Tucson from Northampton, Massachusetts, Ellie reports on the University of Arizona, the largest employer in the city of Tucson, and Pima Community College. She talks to David about her previous experience at The Boston Globe and The Maine Monitor, how she manages covering such a large beat, how Ellie holds the University of Arizona accountable through her journalism and all the exciting moments she has had in the job so far.
