With interviews for two out of three candidates for the open position of director of the Prindle Institute completed, the decision is close to being made.
James Norton, dean of the School of Liberal Arts and an English professor at Marian University, spoke to students, faculty and staff in a discussion about ethics on Monday afternoon in Harrison Hall.
The program consisted of a discussion about ethics and rural ethics led by Norton, a brief description of his vision for the Prindle Institute, and a question and answer session.
"Prindle needs a point," Norton said. "It has an identity, but in higher education and generally speaking in the world today, it needs a kind of point or identity of the thing that it does really, really, really well. It needs to be the go-to place for this particular skill."
Norton stressed the importance of rural ethics for Prindle, since the institute is located in rural Indiana.
"I think one point to really focus on is to take advantage of DePauw's location, it's space, where it is in time and space, right here in Indiana," Norton said.
An email listing Norton's qualifications was sent out to all DePauw community members. A few of Norton's qualifications include strategic planning, fundraising and civic engagement. He also developed and oversees Marian's Center for Organizational Ethics.
Although Norton has experience in the field of ethics, some students were not impressed with his interview.
"I think he kept talking in circles," said first-year Prindle Intern Vanessa Freije. "I wasn't impressed with his ability."
After the strong leadership of the first two Prindle directors, Bob Steele, '69, and former University president Robert Bottoms, the new director will have big shoes to fill.
"The Prindle [Institute] is trying to get someone who is a true visionary," Freije said. "[Someone] who can actually take the Prindle to the next step because we already have such a great institution that what we need to see happen is it being more noticeably active...making it more of a resource for the students to use."
Since the first two candidates have similar ideas for the direction of Prindle, Freije thinks it will be interesting to see what the third and final candidate has to offer.
"Both [candidates] had good suggestions about tying the Prindle [institute] into the Greencastle community," Freije said. "That's one similarity they had."
Senior Prindle Intern Garth Synnestvedt is the only student on the search committee involved in hiring the new director.
"I'm a student representative basically giving a student voice on the hiring process as the Prindle intern and as a senior student," Synnestvedt said.
The third candidate will not be revealed until a few days before his or her scheduled visit, and the decision of who will be hired for the director of Prindle will be made after all three final candidates have interviewed.