Next fall will begin a year of change for Tufts. University President Lawrence Bacow will leave in June, and Provost and Senior Vice President Jamshed Bharucha just announced Sunday that he, too, will depart Tufts at the end of this academic year to serve as president of The Cooper Union in New York City.
When Bacow first assumed the position of university president in 2001, he told the Board of Trustees that he intended to stay for 10 years. In spite of this, his announcement last February came as a shock to many. Even more jarring is the fact that Bacow and Bharucha are just two among a handful of university heads who are planning to leave Tufts after this year.
Robert Hollister, co−founder and dean of the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service, Eileen Kennedy, who serves as dean of the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy and Lonnie Norris, dean of the School of Dental Medicine, will all be leaving Tufts this summer. Hollister and Kennedy plan on returning to Tufts after a one−year hiatus but in teaching roles. Although all of these administrators have elevated their respective schools to incredible levels of achievement during their long tenures, their departures coincide with Anthony Monaco's transition into the position of university president, a critical period for Tufts.
This exodus of key university leaders begs the question: Whatever happened to institutional memory?
A new president assuming office will obviously mean a considerable change in the way Tufts is run. Monaco is clearly capable of living up to the high standards demanded by the Tufts community, but at the end of the day, he is not the same person as Bacow. The decisions he makes will be different — not necessarily better or worse, but different — than anything the university has experienced over the past decade with Bacow at the helm. The departure of three deans and a provost will multiply all of this change tenfold.
To be fair, Monaco is entitled to a new team of people around him. The slew of new university leaders will mark a new period in Tufts' history and will likely bring exciting advances to the university. Still, the fact that these things are all happening at the same time seems likely to cause quite a bit of institutional shock.
A search committee created to find the next president of Tufts was formed immediately after Bacow announced his decision to step down last February. Although the committee worked vigorously and made an excellent decision in choosing Monaco, selecting administrators is a lengthy process, and it took the committee until November to choose its candidate. Now, with the departure of four other integral administrators, the administration is going to have to quadruple its efforts to name successors.
Bharucha, Hollister, Kennedy and Norris are leaving behind major legacies and big shoes to fill. We can only guess how long it will take to find quality successors for each of them.
We at the Daily congratulate Bharucha on his new position. He and the other three deans have made great advancements for Tufts and are entitled to grow in new positions and endeavors, whether they be on the Hill or not.
But how much change can a university endure in one year? Nobody knows for sure, but one thing is certain: Tufts will definitely need to answer that question come next fall.
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