University Times

The committee searching for a permanent director of the University Center for Social and Urban Research (UCSUR) is looking for additional candidates. UCSUR conducts and facilitates interdisciplinary research on regional and national issues of public policy.

Chaired by George Klinzing, vice provost for research, the search committee at a second of open forum, held Sept. 9, entertained suggestions on what kind of person should direct the center, with its five principal programs and 85 staff members, and in what directions the center should go. The forum drew 11 participants, including five committee members.

The committee had already extended the deadline for nominations of candidates from July 15 to Sept. 15. Klinzing announced that although the deadline was Sept. 15 for nominations, the committee will continue to accept them. "There's nothing about that date that the committee has to stick to. If any of you know people who would make good candidates, contact me or one of the committee members," he said. The target date for having a new director in place is Jan. 1, 1999. Richard Schultz has served as interim director since 1995.

As of today, 17 candidates had been contacted by the committee, including three people suggested at the forum. Klinzing noted that not all of these people are applicants. "Committee members have contacted the individuals we feel have the qualities or potential qualities to make a good director," Klinzing said. Beth Osborne Daponte, UCSUR staff member, asked if the search could be expanded nationally.

"That was a decision made by the administration: to stay internal," Klinzing said. "The problem is getting faculty, who may be happy in their positions, and not even thinking about any kind of change, to consider this position," he said.

Provost James Maher has limited the applicant pool to tenured Pitt faculty.

Regarding desirable characteristics of the director, Laurie Fowler, UCSUR staff member, suggested finding someone to strengthen the infrastructure of the survey research team. "We need survey research to help develop policy. It cuts across the lines of what we do," Fowler said. "We also need an individual who can strengthen city and county links, so we can have a permanent, ongoing relationship with the region. We need somebody with a strong academic background — and not just in FAS — but who can help develop relationships with the public health areas." "And not just public health, but engineering, technical fields, information science," interjected Daponte. "And the person needs to know about the advances in technology: what's involved, and to be able to push for spending in that area," Fowler continued. "And finally, it would be nice if the staff felt supportive of that person," she said.

Louise Comfort, associate professor at Pitt's Graduate School of Public and International Affairs (GSPIA), said, "The person must have a record of success in research proposals. Someone who understands sponsored research. And that means building support through governmental agencies: Those are the people who vote for the money." Search committee member Steve Manners, also an UCSUR staff member, responded, "No one individual will have all the connections to cover the scope of this center — maybe of an individual program — but the director must have the support to coordinate programs within the center. It's more of a personality trait or a management skill." Morton Coleman, a professor in Pitt's School of Social Work and a committee member, asked if there were any additional fields that the center should focus on.

Comfort responded, "Complex adaptive systems. It's a new field; it started in physics, biology, math, then moved, reluctantly I might add, to the social sciences, to cognitive psychology. It's interactive: studying people and organizations; how people process and manage information. They're studying it at Cal Tech, Stanford, MIT: applying adaptive systems to social systems, with the goal of building communities. Isn't that what the center should be doing: trying to build communities? It's interdisciplinary. It includes economists, biologists, social scientists, computer scientists — all working on viable ways to build a community." Coleman responded, "Well, we have to consider that educators in different fields — hard sciences, social sciences, humanities– have different, shall we say, cultures; ways of thinking about things. It's hard to combine these cultures. I think part of the director's job will be to coordinate and link them." Comfort said, "Still, the center should create relationships with communities. Do research, disseminate research, do modeling. And it should make findings of research available in an accessible way to the community; establish a community-wide knowledge base: information about transportation, housing," she said.

Manners said, "That's definitely more a resource issue. We have plans, probably have had them for a couple years, to get more information, which we have, out there. We should have regional hard data on the Web, for example, in a couple of months." Committee member Christina Groark, UCSUR staff member, added, "I think we need a vision different from what's going on. Take the Office of Child Development, which is a kind of microscopic version of the center: We do policy evaluation, program evaluation, research demonstrations, and each of these [components] can be further broken down. The question is: How do you get a matrix that connects them? What lines do they cut across? It's a management skill to get them to talk to each other, but we also need someone with a vision. We're doing good stuff, but maybe it's time to move on. What fits in with the interdisciplinary nature of what UCSUR should be doing?" Manners said, "The center has established many capabilities that cut across lines: program evaluation, research management, doing proposals, survey research. We bring all those to the table. What else can we add to our arsenal? What standing product that we don't have now?" Coleman said, "I would hope that the new director, in fact, all serious candidates for the director would have discussions with the staff about how to reorganize the center. I would hope there would be an open forum. In fact, we can require it of the candidates to talk about just these things." Lequita Blockson, graduate student at Pitt's Katz business school, asked, "What areas in the University does this center usually deal with? Until I heard about this [public forum] I didn't even know you existed." Manners said, "We have had lots of projects for GSPIA, social work, political science, public health, education; really, all across the University." UCSUR staff member Scott Beach said to Blockson, "Your saying: 'I didn't even know you existed' really struck a chord with me. We really need someone who knows how to promote this place. Someone who has marketing [background]; someone with a vision as to how to get us known." Klinzing acknowledged the center's low-profile. "But there certainly is a lot of potential, a lot of opportunity to increase activity with not only FAS but the social sciences and others," he said.

Coleman summarized: "What we've heard are that the person should increase linkages to the region; should have a high-level educational background; should bring in more schools, engineering, health sciences, and others; should have an advanced knowledge in technology; should have strength in research proposals; and should have a vision for the center." Klinzing added that it would be up to the committee to prioritize these attributes.

–Peter Hart