Board Approves Hiring of Next Chief Academic Officer

The Pennsylvania College of Technology Board of Directors today approved the hiring of Lizabeth Self Mullens as the next vice president for academic affairs/provost. Mullens, who has served as director of the Women's Leadership Initiative in the College of Health and Human Development at The Pennsylvania State University since 2003, will assume her new position on July 1.

Veronica M. Muzic, who plans to retire from the vice president/provost position later this year after more than 30 years of teaching and administrative leadership at the college, will remain for several months to aid in Mullens? transition into the role of chief academic officer.

Previously, Mullens had 11 years of faculty and administrative experience in Maine. She began as an adjunct faculty member at Southern Maine Technical College and later worked with the University of Maine first as a consultant with the Maine Work and Family Institute at the university's Farmington campus and later as an educator with the university's cooperative-extension program and a local adult and community education unit.

She began her career in 1977 as a graduate research assistant at The University of Tennessee in Knoxville, where she earned her Ph.D. in human ecology-interdisciplinary and her master's degree in textiles and apparel after completing a bachelor's degree in home economics education at Miami University, Ohio. She joined the faculty in the School of Home Economics at Tennessee Technological University in 1979; from 1985-89, she served as director of the School of Home Economics and associate dean of the College of Agriculture & Home Economics at that university. From 1989-92, she was the assistant vice president for academic affairs and dean of graduate and summer programs at Adams State College in Colorado.

In other business, the board authorized College President Davie Jane Gilmour to accept bids and award contracts for construction of the Center for Business and Workforce Development, provided the cost of all contracts does not exceed the architect?s estimates by more than 10 percent. Bids will be opened on May 2.

The one-story structure at 1127 W. Fourth St. will be the new home for Workforce Development & Continuing Education, the Penn State Continuing Education at Williamsport, and the Industrial Modernization Center. Currently, those facilities are all housed at the Business and Technology Resource Center on Reach Road. The new building will also include laboratories and faculty offices for the college's electronics program.

The board also authorized the college to continue operations at the levels budgeted for Fiscal Year 2005-06 if a state budget for 2006-07 is not passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Rendell by June 30.

Muzic informed the board about faculty sabbatical requests that have been approved for Spring 2007. They are: Jeffrey D. Mather, assistant professor of drafting/CAD technology; Mark D. Noe, professor of English-composition; and Nicholas A. Vonada, associate professor of computer science.

The board heard a presentation on the School of Health Sciences by its dean, Kathleen E. Morr, and another about a group of Penn College students who used their Spring Break trip to travel to Mississippi and assist with hurricane-cleanup efforts there.