Key staff positions continue to fall into place at Mississippi University for Women, with the college naming its new provost and vice president for academic affairs earlier this week.
Dr. Dan Heimmermann, who hails from the University of Texas at Brownsville, will join MUW’s leadership team Aug. 1. He will be the university’s first full-time provost since the resignation of Dr. Sandra Brown in 2009.
It’s a powerful position, the second-highest ranked on campus. Heimmermann’s duties will include directing and supporting academic policies, supervising deans and programs, overseeing the registrar’s office, library, honors college, instructional technology, institutional research, grants and sponsored programs, graduate studies, global e-college and providing support and advising for specialized academic programs.
His duties will also include administrative responsibility for budget preparation and supervision, curriculum development, strategic planning, assessment, accreditation, program evaluation and scheduling.
He will report directly to MUW President Dr. Jim Borsig.
But don’t expect Heimmermann to completely leave the classroom. Even while holding his current position as dean of the College of Liberal Arts at UTB, he still found time to teach a history course each semester, and he said once he gets settled at MUW, he hopes to continue teaching history on a limited basis.
It was, after all, a professor who inspired him to follow the path into academia.
Heimmermann said he has modeled his career after Dr. Julius Ruff, a scholar and history professor at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wis., where Heimmermann earned a master’s degree and doctorate in European History. He holds double bachelor’s degrees in history and Spanish from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh.
Ruff, who remains in contact with his former student, always managed to maintain a scholarly agenda, even while actively teaching and learning, Heimmermann said. Through Ruff’s influence over him, he learned the influence faculty can have upon students, helping them not only become passionate about a topic but also encouraging them to stay in school.
Like Borsig, Heimmermann maintains MUW’s future, and the future of colleges nationwide, depends upon recruitment and retention. It’s one thing to get students enrolled; it’s quite another to make sure they graduate.
Keeping students in school until they graduate is important for the students’ success as well as for colleges’ financial security, he said, especially as federal and state governments begin to allocate money based upon enrollment and graduation rates.
He said he was drawn to MUW by its niche as a liberal arts university and the intimate learning experience the small campus can provide. He is also encouraged by a new tuition-waiver law which went into effect July 1, allowing the state’s colleges and universities to waive out-of-state tuition for students who live just across the state line. The new law is expected to be implemented at MUW by next spring.
Heimmermann comes to MUW with a rich administrative portfolio and deep roots within his chosen field of study.
Prior to his position at UTB, he served as chair of the department of history and political science at the University of North Alabama in Florence, Ala., where he received a number of research fellowships.
But his first love remains European history, specifically the history of France.
Heimmermann lived for a year in Bordeaux, France and has visited several times while researching his book-in-progress, which focuses upon worker culture in 18th century Bordeaux and is the culmination of more than two decades of research.
“Every administrator got into this business because they got into teaching a certain discipline,” he said Friday. “You do it because you love academia and teaching it. But there’s something about assisting faculty in realizing their goals related to teaching, scholarship and service that’s quite exhilarating.”
In his spare time, Heimmermann enjoys watching football, fishing, weight training, reading and spending time with his family. He and his wife, Claudia, have a 6-year-old daughter, Lucie. They also share their home with a 2-year-old Labradoodle dog.
Carmen K. Sisson is the former news editor at The Dispatch.
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