Fayneese Miller will be the first candidate to make her pitch to be the University of Idaho’s next provost and executive vice president. She will present at an open forum at 3:30 p.m. Thursday in the Bruce Pitman Center Vandal Ballroom, formerly the Student Union Building.
Miller is the dean of the College of Education and Social Services at the University of Vermont and has been in the position for nearly a decade. Miller has served as chair of the Vermont State Board of Education and works along side upper administrators as chairman of the Council of Deans.
“She goes kind of above and beyond the duties of a dean,” said Ellen Baker, director of teacher education at UV who has worked with Miller for the past eight years.
Fayneese S. Miller, dean of University of Vermont College of Education and Social Services
Miller will also attend various meetings with campus stakeholders and meet with the search committee while visiting UI.
Before her time at UV, Miller spent two decades as a professor at Brown University where she also served as director of the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America. At Brown, Miller also served as the long-time chairman of the university’s Affirmative Action Committee and was the founding chair of the Ethnic Studies program.
As dean at UV, Miller worked to increase diversity within her college, secured gifts of up to $12 million for the university and led the effort for a new Ph.D. proposal that was approved in 2011.
Baker said Miller is a visionary for the college and brought faculty together to evaluate programs.
“She has a strong sense of the overall picture,” Baker said.
Miller supports professional development for faculty members and was instrumental in supporting an international program that sends education students to teach in New Zealand, Baker said.
Baker said Miller is easy to collaborate with and always makes time for students. Miller has even been known to answer calls from students in the middle of the night and make a trip to the dorms if they are having a problem, Baker said.
“She’s always available to the students,” she said.
Baker said that dedication transfers to her work. Miller takes pride in her college’s personal advising program that takes care of students on a professional and personal level, Baker said.
Miller is a strong voice for education, Baker said, whether leading Vermont’s State Board of Education or working as a liaison between the State Legislature and the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education.
Like UI, the university of Vermont is a public research university and is the state’s land-grant institution, with an enrollment of 10,500 undergraduate students and 1,500 postgraduate students.
Baker said Miller is a compassionate administrator who puts student and faculty needs first.
“She a fun loving person and a caring person,” Baker said. “And she is deeply invested in the future of education.”
Katherine Aiken, interim provost and executive vice president, encouraged faculty members to take part in the process and give feedback on candidates at Tuesday’s Faculty Senate meeting.
“We’re going to be chit chatting with people quite extensively in the next couple weeks, so game on,” Aiken said.
Ryan Tarinelli can be reached at [email protected]