With a search committee created to find applicants for the position, there could be a new dean at the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences in about a year.
UF Provost Janie Fouke announced the creation of the 10-person committee in a memo to UF's deans, directors and department chairs Tuesday.
In an interview she said it only took about a week to put the group together.
Pramod Khargonekar, the College of Engineering dean, will chair the committee.
The committee includes four professors, two associate professors, the graduate school dean, an alumnus and a student.
The group will immediately begin formulating a job description and putting out advertisements, according to the memo.
The next few months will be spent collecting nominations and applications.
There could be about 50 to 100 candidates, Fouke said, but she didn't know for sure. By November or December, the committee should have narrowed the list to about a dozen people, she said.
Committee interviews with the nominees will probably begin in January and she would probably interview the four or five finalists after that, she said.
She said it could take a year or so to fill the position.
Joe Glover, CLAS interim dean, said he thinks it would have been better to create the committee in the spring, but he's happy it's finally happening.
Glover said he didn't want to comment on whether he would be willing to fill the position if he's nominated.
He said that he would nominate anyone he thinks would make a good CLAS dean but didn't have any candidates in mind yet.
Things have been going well for CLAS lately, Glover said, "aside from the general financial problems of the whole university."
Though UF still struggles with cutting ,30 million to ,34 million, Glover said this would be CLAS' last year in debt.
In summer 2006, a ,6 million CLAS debt was uncovered, but UF immediately paid it off with its rainy-day funds. The college accrued another debt of ,4 million for 2007's expenses.
CLAS' former dean, Neil Sullivan, announced his resignation in November 2006.
When Glover replaced him in January, he agreed to stay a year. If the search committee hasn't found anyone by that time, Glover said he didn't know what would happen.
