The committee looking for a new chief information officer for the University has narrowed its search to a shortlist of candidates and expects to make a final decision by the end of the semester.
The committee is now looking at a list of three or four candidates, said Daniel Leventhal '07, a computer science major and member of the search committee.
Brown's CIO is responsible for managing the University's academic and administrative technology services and working with the University Librarian on systems such as the Josiah catalog.
The search committee is looking for a candidate who will help modernize the University's aging technology, said Elizabeth Huidekoper, executive vice president for finance and administration.
Huidekoper said the ideal candidate for the position would be a "good manager, good planner, has good tech credentials and understands technology in the higher education community."
Though some services, such as MyCourses and wireless expansion, are already undergoing expansion and improvement, "a lot" of work is still needed on administrative systems, Huidekoper said. She noted that the most costly upgrades are for administrative systems, such as those for finance and human resources.
The new vice president will "work within Brown to develop a strategic plan for IT and ensure that plan will be effectively managed so it is accomplished," said Huidekoper, who co-chairs the search committee with Associate Professor of Computer Science David Laidlaw.
Leventhal said the need for improvement to campus IT is significant.
"Brown has been technically stagnant for a long time and needs to pull out," Leventhal said. "Improvements are needed to the network, the human resources system, the system for professors' grants and a payroll system update - systems inherent to any business."
"The amount of paper that gets passed around here is astounding," he said. "Other schools are all digital."
The position of vice president for Computing and Information Services and CIO was vacated last September when Ellen Waite-Franzen left Brown to take a similar position at Dartmouth. Terri-Lynn Thayer '81 has filled the post at Brown on an interim basis since then.
"Dartmouth is in a different place with how they think about technology and how it should be used on campus. At Brown, IT takes more of a backseat, while at Dartmouth, the college continues to assume a leadership role at the forefront of the industry," Waite-Franzen told the Dartmouth student newspaper in a July 27 article.
But Huidekoper said Brown has been putting more resources into technology in recent years. For example, she said, $10 million was put towards network improvements while Waite-Franzen was CIO.
"The department is strong - it's really in a much better position now than it was five years ago," Huidekoper said.
Leventhal and Huidekoper both said the committee is looking for a candidate who will remain at Brown for the foreseeable future. Waite-Franzen left after just under five years on the job.
"We don't want to do this again in three years," Leventhal said. "It takes so long to get up to speed that you need to be here for at least four years."
