IPFW chancellor search committee formed
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Purdue University is announcing the formation of a search committee to identify the next chancellor of Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, succeeding Michael Wartell as chancellor effective July 1, 2012. Wartell has been the longest-serving leader of IPFW in the institution's 48-year history.
The search committee will be co-chaired by Richard Buckius, Purdue vice president for research, and a prominent member of the IPFW faculty or administration. Purdue trustee JoAnn Brouillette and William Cast, chair of the Indiana University Board of Trustees, also will serve on the committee. Additional committee members will be announced following discussions with the IPFW Faculty Senate, and will include faculty, staff, students and community representatives. The committee will be assisted by the search firm Baker and Associates LLC.
"IPFW is an integral part of the Purdue University system and will continue to be so," said Tom Spurgeon, vice chairman of the Purdue Board of Trustees. "Given its importance, the board believes it is critical that we begin a search that will allow ample time in which to find a chancellor who is as dynamic a leader as Mike Wartell."
Wartell, a professor of chemistry, joined IPFW in 1993 as vice chancellor for academic affairs and became its eighth chancellor in 1994.
During Wartell's administration, IPFW expanded the number of degree and certificate options at the undergraduate and graduate levels, added more than 100 acres to the campus property, became the first regional campus in Indiana to offer on-campus student housing, and brought 16 men's and women's sports into NCAA Division I athletic competition. The university endowment also grew from $3 million to $35 million, and the university raised $60 million from alumni and supporters under his leadership.
Landmark construction projects include a Medical Education Center, two bridges that connect the residential campus and two academic campuses, the Rhinehart Music Center, and a soccer complex. Wartell also oversaw construction of a student services facility and attracted a Holiday Inn conference center to campus.
Community service and engagement projects included partnering to open the Northeast Indiana Innovation Center in 2005 and holding the first IPFW Riverfest in 2010. "Mastodons on Parade" celebrated IPFW's 40th anniversary in 2005, and an auction of the miniature mastodon statues raised more than $200,000 for United Way.
Purdue's retirement policy requires university executives and staff in high policy-making positions to retire by the end of the fiscal year in which they turn 65 if they have been employed in their current positions for two years immediately before retirement and qualify for the minimum retirement benefit specified by federal law.
Media contact: Chris Sigurdson, Purdue assistant vice president for external relations, 765-496-2644, sig@purdue.edu