At the end of the school year, Dean of the College of Engineering and Computing (CEC), Marek Dollar, and Dean of the Farmer School of Business (FSB), Marc Rubin, will be stepping down from their positions. Dollar will remain in a teaching role, but Rubin will retire from Miami University.
Dollar has been dean of the CEC for 20 years. Before his time at Miami, he served as chair of the Department of Mechanical, Materials and Aerospace Engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago.
“I am already among the longest-serving deans in the history of Miami University,” Dollar wrote in an email to The Miami Student. “And, after a careful analysis, I came to the conclusion that the time has come for me to change the trajectory of my career by moving back to where I came from, meaning refocusing on teaching and research.”
The search committee for a new CEC dean, headed by Dean of Miami Regionals Catherine Bishop-Clark, just began looking for candidates. Bishop-Clark said the committee hopes to pick prospects by December to interview in mid-January. Three to four of those candidates will then be brought to campus in late January or early February for more interviews.
“It’s going to be a difficult search because the current dean has been in the position for 20 years,” Bishop-Clark said. “He’s done a very excellent job, and he's very well respected at the university and inside the college.”
Meanwhile, Rubin, a Miami alumni, has been a part of the faculty since 1990 when he worked as an assistant professor of accounting. He was promoted to professor in 1997. In 2017, Rubin, then the chair of the accounting department, was asked to take over as interim dean. In January 2018, he was appointed as dean.
“I said, ‘I'm not a candidate for the permanency job,’” Rubin explained. “[The search committee] did search for a permanent dean, but they didn't find a match that they liked.”
When Matthew Myers, Rubin’s predecessor, stepped down, dean of the College of Arts and Science Christopher Makaroff was made head of the search committee to find a replacement.
“When all was said and done, none of the candidates was determined to be acceptable,” Markaoff wrote in an email to The Student. “In consultation with the president, the Provost closed the search.”
Rubin was asked to stay with Miami in the role of dean. He agreed, but he would only stay on until his retirement in 2020. Rubin said that being dean was never something he planned. But, he said the experience has been "terrific."
“It's been a real honor and privilege for me to serve back to my alma mater,” Rubin said. “It's been honestly a real privilege to do this.”
While Rubin said he has no definite plans for his retirement, he has been approached about teaching and consulting jobs. For at least the first year of retirement, though, Rubin said he’d like to spend more time with his family.
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“I wanted to be closer to family,” Rubin said. “I have my daughter and her family up in Chicago, and my son and his wife are in Washington, DC, and I don't get to see enough of them.”
Dollar and Rubin both said they hope their respective successors are strategic planners.
"In my mind, Miami should attract a new dean who would lead, rather than manage our college," Dollar wrote. "I would see in this role an individual who would be trusted and respected both within the college and at the university."
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