Paul Bomberger’s deep voice emanated from a speakerphone in the middle of a conference room as he talked about his business experience and the importance of “being an advocate for students.” Two women listened intently, another rolled her eyes and two others typed on their BlackBerrys.
There were supposed to be eight people listening. Ten minutes later, two more people walked into the room late as Bomberger was discussing the future of print journalism.
Bomberger, a former deputy business editor at the Sun Sentinel and current freelance journalist, was interviewing to become FAU’s first director of student media — a position created more than two and a half years ago to oversee the college’s student newspaper and the student-run television and radio stations. The position will pay between $48,000 and $53,000.
His audience included members of a search committee — administrators, faculty and students — whose job it is to select a candidate to present to Student Affairs. Senior Vice President of Student Affairs Charles Brown and Dean of Students Corey King have the final say on who gets hired.
The position has been posted six times since it was first created in June 2007. The committee has been chaired by two administrators. The members have changed several times and have included at least 16 people — half of them haven’t come to more than two meetings. (Full disclosure: As former UP editor in chief, I have been a member of this committee since the beginning.)
The search committee has reviewed more than 150 resumes, conducted phone interviews with more than 15 applicants and brought six candidates to campus (one of them twice) for daylong interviews — three of them two weeks ago. (Scroll down to “meet the candidates” for more.)
“The position has taken so long to hire because the university has gone through budget cuts and we just haven’t found the right candidate yet,” A.J. Chase, current chair of the search committee and associate dean of students for the northern campuses, said at the end of Bomberger’s interview.
Bomberger didn’t work out, either. Marion Merzer, search committee member and associate dean of students for the broward campuses, said he was “boring” and “quite a talker.” Bomberger was surprised.
His thoughts on the interview?
“In my journalism career as both an interviewer and as a job candidate being interviewed, punctuality is always important,” he said. “To have two people come in late — one at the tail end of a 45-minute interview — it was surprising and disappointing.”
Budget cuts aside, Bomberger’s interview and the inaccuracies in the process are not unique. This search committee setup is what FAU uses to hire all administrative positions at the director level and above — other searches currently going on include director of Student Government, director of research programs and director of the Boca campus Student Union.
Problem is, this process is different from the ones run by every other Florida university. In fact, one University of Florida official says it might even be illegal.
“Per Florida statues, search committees are required to take and post minutes from their meetings,” says Melissa Curry, associate director at UF’s Human Resources Service Center. “You could be cited by the state, you can even be sued — it’s very important.”
Since FAU’s search committee meetings for the director of student media began in 2007, no one on the committee has ever taken or posted meeting minutes. However, this isn’t the only minute-less search committee meeting. There are currently six other administrative level positions being filled by search committees and none of them has ever taken nor posted minutes on the FAU Web site.
Following the rules
Taking and posting meeting minutes isn’t the only rule UF search committees follow. Under the Office of the Provost, UF has an entire Web site devoted to “Search and Screen Guidelines” that outline how and whensearch committees should be set up, the responsibilities of the chairperson and committee members and guidelines for internal searches.
In fact, there are 18 items on the guide’s table of contents alone, which is preceded by a five-paragraph message from the provost stating the importance of the recruitment and hiring process.
Curry says it’s important to have such rules because it “streamlines the process” and “makes sure everything is done correctly.” Curry also says UF will soon implement a training course that each member of a search committee will need to take before serving on the committee.
Florida International University has a 14-page “Search & Screen Guide” outlining hiring for administrative positions, including how to conduct telephone interviews, important questions to ask the candidates and how to critique and recommend a top candidate. There’s another guide for faculty positions.
FAU has only one paragraph of rules regarding how search committees should function.
The two main rules: “The search committee must be diverse in gender and race” and “all members of the committee should possess the professional experience and background necessary to be objective in the assessment of the prospective candidates’ qualifications.”
FAU’s Human Resources Director El pagnier K. Hudson acknowledged that FAU needs to add to these rules.
“We’re trying to develop guidelines for search committee meetings like we currently have for faculty positions,” Hudson said in March. “We hope to have these new guidelines revised by April.”
That was seven months ago. There are currently no new guidelines regarding the search committee process at FAU. (Scroll down to “search rules” to read FAU’s rules in their entirety.)
Candidates gone wrong
Of the 15 applicants that the director of student media search committee has interviewed by phone, six candidates have been brought to campus.
Three of them were told no, thanks. Three others are still in the running for the position. And one applicant filed a complaint with the Equal Opportunity Programs Office after she claimed discriminated based on her gender.
Susan Alyn, who applied the first time the position was posted, dropped out to take another job after she was selected as a top-10 candidate. She reapplied when it was posted for the third time in May 2008 and was selected, after phone interviews, as the top candidate. She was the only applicant brought to campus in August 2008 from that search.
Alyn spent the evening of Aug. 27 meeting with students and was slotted to spend the next day in a myriad of meetings and interviews. But, as she explained later in an e-mail to student media leaders, she felt “humiliated” after meeting with Student Affairs members and left halfway through the second day. A few days later, she sent an e-mail to the search committee chair withdrawing her candidacy.
A month later, Alyn filed a complaint with the Equal Opportunity Programs Office (EOPO) stating she was discriminated against because of her gender.
She said later in an e-mail to former FAU President Frank Brogan that she felt there needed to be an investigation into what she called a “pattern of gender discrimination at FAU.”
Associate Dean of Students Terry Mena said FAU’s EOPO has investigated the complaint and it is now closed. As of press time, no one from the EOPO could be reached for comment.
When asked about the status of her complaint, Alyn declined to comment, except to mention that she happily relocated to Boston, Massachusetts.
What happens now?
Paul Bomberger was not selected as one of the top candidates but three others from his applicant pool were.
These three candidates — Peter Dobens, a former news manager at WPBF-TV and current employee at the United Way of Palm Beach County; Glenn Singer, a former Sun Sentinel copy editor and current FAU adjunct journalism professor; and Marti Harvey, a former editor at the Mesquite News and current student publications manager at Eastfield College, in Texas — came to campus the week of Nov. 16 .
The next step in the hiring process is for the search committee to meet a final time and select a candidate to present to Student Affairs. As of press time, no meeting date has been set.
While the search committee will suggest a candidate to Student Affairs, Senior Vice President of Student Affairs Charles Brown and Dean of Students Corey King will ultimately make the final decision. If none of these three candidates are hired, the position could be posted once again, for a seventh time.
“I think we had a really good pool of candidates this time, probably the best ever,” Brown said on Nov. 24. “We hope to make a job offer before the holiday break and get someone into office by February, maybe even March.”
Bomberger, along with several candidates who commented off the record, was surprised when he heard the search for the director of student media has been going on since June 2007.
“Any time a hiring process drags on for a length of time, it raises a red flag about the search process itself.”
What’s taken so long?
In the two and a half years since the director of student media position was first posted, Barack Obama was elected president, the stock market crashed, and gas prices in Florida were as high as $4.05. The Owls lost 13 football games, FAU named a new police chief and hired new baseball and men’s basketball coaches.
Key dates in FAU’s search for a director of student media:
July 6, 2007: First posting for the director of student media position closes, FAU receives 18 applicants.
July 18, 2007: First search committee for the position is formed and Heather Bishara, former Jupiter campus assistant director of student life and recreation, is named chair. (Bishara is now interim director of Student Government)
Aug. 12, 2007: Applicant Susan Alyn, named a top 10 candidate by the search committee, posts five comments on a University Press blog about how she’s “taking another job” but “wishes the staff the best.”
Oct. 23, 2007: Director of student media position is posted again. Search committee members change.
Nov. 20, 2007: Second director of student media application pool closes, and FAU receives more than 20 applicants.
Dec. 5, 2007: The search committee decides to skip phone interviews and bring the top three candidates to campus.
Jan. 8-11, 2008: Candidates Ron Sherer, Jennifer Shapiro and Debra Walcott Annane come to the Boca campus for daylong interviews.
May 26, 2008: Director of student media position is posted for a third time.
June 30, 2008: Third director of student media application pool closes, FAU receives 18 applicants.
July 2, 2008: Job description for the director of student media is revised to include the need for “knowledge of press law and journalism.” The base salary for the position also increases.
Aug. 1, 2008: Search committee decides to bring its top candidate, Susan Alyn, to campus. (Alyn, who dropped out of the first search, reapplied the third time it was posted.)
Aug. 27, 2008: Candidate Susan Alyn visits campus from Naples, Fla. for two days. Alyn meets with students in the media organizations and Student Government leaders on the first day and is scheduled for daylong interviews with Student Affairs leaders on the next.
Aug. 28, 2008: Susan Alyn leaves halfway through the second day of interviews without notice. (See “Candidates gone wrong” above for more.)
Sept. 1, 2008: Susan Alyn officially withdraws her application in an e-mail
to then-search committee chair Heather Bishara.
Sept. 16, 2008: Director of student media position is posted a fourth time.
Oct. 15, 2008: Fourth director of student media application pool closes, FAU receives 20 applicants. Hiring manager and Associate Dean of Students Terry Mena decides to extend the application deadline because we “didn’t receive enough good applicants.”
Oct. 31, 2008: Former candidate Susan Alyn sends former FAU President Frank Brogan an e-mail saying she has filed a complaint with the Office of Equal Opportunity Programs for gender discrimination and is “upset at how it is being handled” by FAU. She states: “If I do not hear from you within 30 days with an appropriate response, I will have no choice but to consider you as part of a conspiracy to violate my civil rights.”
Nov. 4, 2008: At a search committee meeting, Terry Mena says: “We have redesigned the job description and opportunity to recruit a better quality of candidates.”
Nov. 24, 2008: Extended from Oct. 15, the director of student media application pool closes for a fifth time, FAU receives more than 20 applicants. A. J. Chase, associate dean of students for the northern campuses, is named the new chair of the search committee.
Dec. 10, 2008: Search committee meets to review candidates.
Jan. 9-13, 2009: Search committee conducts phone interviews with the top eight candidates — six on Jan. 9 and two on Jan. 13.
Jan. 22-29, 2009: Search committee members identify the top three candidates: Vicki Brennan, Glenn Singer and Kathleen Walter.
Feb. 4, 2009: A. J. Chase says she got the “go-ahead” from Student Affairs to bring the top three candidates to campus. She offers the dates of Feb. 18, 19 and 24, and all committee members agree. (Yet, no dates are finalized and the candidates never come to campus.)
March 27, 2009: The University Press holds an interview with FAU Human Resources Director El pagnier K. Hudson and Employment Director Sharon Berger. Hudson says the director of student media search committee is “not the model” for hiring at FAU.
Same day: Chase sends an e-mail to the committee members stating: “At this time Dr. Brown has the director of student media position, as well as other vacant Student Affairs positions, frozen due to the budget cuts.”
June 30, 2009: Associate Dean of Students Terry Mena announces that the hiring freeze has been lifted and the director for student media position is open for hire once again. New members are added to the search committee.
July 14, 2009: Search committee meets to discuss former top three candidates Vicki Brennan, Glenn Singer and Kathleen Walter. Walter has taken another job. Group decides to repost the position rather than interview only two candidates.
Aug. 14, 2009: Student media director is posted a sixth time.
Sept. 11, 2009: Sixth director of student media application pool closes, FAU receives 80 applicants — the most ever.
Oct. 1, 2009: Search committee meets to select the top candidates for phone interviews. Nine are selected.
Oct. 13-21, 2009: Search committee conducts nine phone interviews.
Oct. 29, 2009: Search committee meets to review reference checks, and identifies the top three candidates: Marti Harvey, Glenn Singer and Peter Dobens.
Nov. 16, 2009: Peter Dobens, a former news manager at WPBF-TV and current United Way of Palm Beach County employee, comes to campus for a daylong interview.
Nov. 18, 2009: Glenn Singer, a former Sun Sentinel copy editor and current FAU adjunct journalism professor, comes to campus for a daylong interview.
Nov. 20, 2009: Marti Harvey, a former editor at the Mesquite News and now student publications manager at Eastfield College in Texas, comes to campus for a daylong interview.
What they do
The first-ever director of student media will serve as the business manager and adviser for all student media, overseeing the University Press, Owl Radio and Owl TV. The position will pay between $48,000 and $53,000.
According to the job summary, as per FAU’s posting in local newspapers and higher education Web sites, this person’s duties and qualifications include:
• Provide overall leadership, direction, management, instruction, mentoring and coordination for student media.
• Serve as adviser of the Student Media Planning Board — The person hired will also have to set this board up once in the position.
• This position will work closely with the other student life professional staff in improving campus life.
• The minimum qualifications include either a master’s degree in journalism or communications and six years of experience or a bachelor’s degree in journalism or communications and eight years of experience.
• Experience in student development and advising, supervision and fiscal management is strongly desired.
• Knowledge of press law and journalism needed.
• Experience in journalism, communication, and related technology and telecommunications is preferred.
After holding six searches, reviewing more than 150 resumes, interviewing at least 15 candidates and inviting six to visit campus, FAU administrators are hopeful they will find the right person for the job this time.
Meet Peter Dobens, Glenn Singer and Marti Harvey — the three journalism professionals vying for FAU’s director of student media position. (Click a candidate’s name to read his or her resume.)
“I think we had a really good pool of candidates this time,” Senior Vice President Student Affairs Charles Brown said on Nov. 25, “probably the best ever.”
All three candidates came to the Boca campus the week of Nov. 16 for daylong interviews. They met with the members of the director of student media search committee, students from the three media outlets and had interviews with members of Student Affairs.
The search committee will meet a final time and select a candidate to present to Brown, Dean of Students Corey King and Associate Dean of Students Terry Mena.
“I’m really looking for someone who can come in and work with our students and our staff and build a relationship with the communications school,” Brown said.
Brown added that his goal is to offer a job to one of these candidates by the end of the academic calendar.
“After we make the job offer we need to give [the candidate] time to leave their current job and tell their family. We hope to get someone into office by February, maybe even March of next year.”
The University of Florida has an entire Web site devoted to defining the search committee process. There are 18 items on the guide’s table of contents alone.
Florida International University’s rules are 14 pages long — and that’s just for hiring administrative positions.
FAU’s rules? Here they are — in their entirety:
A Search Committee is required for all positions at the level of Assistant Director (or equivalent) and above. The search committee must include at least three (3) members. The search committee must be diverse in gender and race. All members of the committee should possess the professional experience and background necessary to be objective in the assessment of the prospective candidates’ qualifications. The names, gender and race of the search committee members must be included in the request to recruit on the Search Committee tab. The Office of Equal Opportunity Programs (EOP) will review/approve all search committees prior to the position being posted.
[Source: FAU’s Human Recourses]
