Newly appointed leadership of the restored School of Graduate Studies will begin discussing more uniform education policies with graduate program directors and students this summer, according to the school’s new dean, Constantin Rasinariu.

Rasinariu, formerly the interim dean of the School of Media Arts, was announced as the dean of the School of Graduate Studies in a June 7 email from Senior Vice President and Provost Stan Wearden.

The goal is to have the school up and running by the end of the Fall 2016 Semester, Rasinariu said.

Columbia outlined the goal of hiring a new dean and forming the school in the collegewide Strategic Plan, bringing back its school dedicated to graduate studies that was disbanded in 2010.

The college had two previous graduate deans, Lya Dim Rosenblum and Keith Cleveland. The position was abolished by then-Provost Steve Kapelke.

While existing graduate  programs will still be directed within departments and the three current schools, Rasinariu and the school will provide administrative leadership for graduate study collegewide, he said.

“It’s a general model that’s used in academia all across the United States,” he said. “There are several ways you can work about it. For us, I believe the best model is to continue the department control on the curriculum with the graduate programs, so the graduate school will be like an overarching structure. It will help not only administer, but also enhance and open it in new directions.”

Unlike the college’s other deans who review faculty for tenure and design curriculum with departments directly reporting to them, Rasinariu’s role will be to create and implement more specific policies that will apply collegewide, such as how thesis’ classes and projects will be conducted and how  graduate assistantships will be directed, according to Wearden.

He added that he chose the former Media Arts dean not only because of his own scholarly and professional successes,  but also because of his ability to listen to different voices and “synthesize” different points of views.

“He’s widely respected across the campus—faculty, the other deans, department chairs—and that’s going to be critically important as well,” Wearden said

In order to financially support its new graduate school administration, the college recently underwent “faculty reorganization” in Academic Affairs, according to Wearden.

“We took a look at [positions] in some cases we felt were no longer needed,” Wearden said. “In many cases, they were positions that were open, and we just didn’t fill them. We repurposed the funding instead.”

Dawn Larsen, former chair  of the college’s Graduate Policy Council was announced as the school’s associate dean June 13. She said she will assist Rasinariu as they begin by meeting with college stakeholders through the summer and fall.

After that, she said, they will  decide  best practices for creating collegewide graduate structures and possible new initiatives such as online degrees, certificate programs and international opportunities.

Rasinariu said he is also interested in working with Robert Green, the college’s vice provost for Digital Learning, to look into online opportunities for graduate students.

Larsen said the GPC has asked for a separate graduate school since President and CEO Kwang-Wu Kim arrived at the college in the Fall 2013 Semester and later and began working with Wearden when he arrived in 2014.

“This is a first step in something that was a long time in the making …. Now it’s all coming to fruition, and  we’re just very happy about that.” Larsen said.

Wearden said he was interested in reforming the school to create “self-sustaining” graduate enrollment and streamline policies.

“Graduate enrollment has gradually trailed off and been shrinking year by year,” Wearden said. “I think a lot of that was a lack of leadership in graduate studies. That’s not to say there isn’t leadership at the department level but lack of that overarching, institutional leadership.”

Rasinariu said he hopes he is successful in the school’s intention to attract students and create more opportunities for them to continue their education.

“I anticipate there will be challenges, which I welcome,” Rasinariu said. “It’s definitely not going to be an easy process, and I  will need help from graduate faculty, students and administration. I look forward to focusing all of this positive energy on making this happen.”