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The backdrop to this blunt resolution is a series of internal and external audits in recent years that judged Medill–which enjoys seeing itself as a journalism school without equal–as an academic basket case. President Henry Bienen and provost Lawrence Dumas stepped in. Skipping the usual faculty search committee they named John Lavine (pictured) the next dean in late 2005, and in early 2006 they booted aside the incumbent, who had months to go on his contract. Lavine was already on site: he was the founding director of NU’s Media Management Center, a fee-charging profit center housed in the journalism school.
The resolution continues, “If the Administration in the future concludes that an unacceptable academic situation warrants the temporary suspension of the normal role of the faculty ‘to prescribe and define the course of study’ [a quote from NU’s statutes], such suspension should be only for a set, limited period and only after formal approval by the Board of Trustees made after the consideration of the views of all concerned faculty.”
