By Jack Armstrong News Editor
Western has announced Dr. Rex Fuller as the new president of the university, effective on July 1, 2015. Fuller will be taking over for president Mark Weiss, retiring June 30, 2015.
Weiss announced his retirement at the beginning of the 2014-2015 academic year and a committee was appointed to find his replacement. Members of the committee included representatives from the Oregon State Board of Higher Education, the Western board of trustees, and the president’s office.
Fuller was selected from a group of four finalists which also included Dr. Fernando Delgado, Dr. Margaret Madden, and Dr. Christopher Ames.
The four finalists were further vetted after their announcement on March 30. All of the candidates were interviewed both behind closed doors, and in an open-to-the-public, town hall style forum.
Once the interview process was completed, Western’s committee passed their recommendation for selection on to the OSBHE. The State Board voted Fuller in as the official replacement April 16.
Fuller received his undergraduate degree from California State-Chico, and proceeded to get his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Utah.
Fuller will begin his time as the 23rd Western president this summer by leaving his current position as provost and vice president of Academic Affairs at Eastern Washington University, which he has held since 2010.
“Being a provost and serving as a vice president is a full time job,” Fuller said. “It can be all consuming.”
The transition to his new position is promising for Fuller, who said, “being a provost is almost exclusively an internal administrative job, but the presidency gives me a chance to work out and about on campus.”
While the title of president will be new, Fuller is no stranger to the administrative side of university life. He started his current carrier path serving as a full-time dean for more than 20 years at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and Colorado State University.
Fuller has made his way to EWU, which has around 13,000 students, more than double the size of Western’s student body. Fuller said he believes that this smaller size can be advantageous to Western’s approach to recruitment.
“Western is small enough to have conversations with all of the faculty and students on a regular basis,” Fuller said. “But, we are still large enough to have the academic diversity of a regionally comprehensive university.”
Regionally comprehensive universities like Western typically offer a broad spectrum of academic programs from science to the liberal arts. They were originally created to service a specific region within a state, but always have more of a focus on teaching as supposed to research.
Western still remains a unique challenge for Fuller though, and he looks forward to expanding the university in any way he can.
“Western has the opportunity to draw students from throughout the I-5 corridor,” He said. “We have to make the case for why Western is the best choice, a very positive choice. We have to reach out to the community.”
Overall growth is a long term goal for Fuller; in the interim, he intends to focus on getting to know the new board of trustees that will take the place of the Oregon University System board here at Western.
“My first few months will be working with the new legislative board and getting to know my new team,” he said. “I think it’s an advantage to work with the new independent board; I’ve worked in both systems and the independent universities have more control over their own destinies.”
Fuller added: “I’ve always aspired to be a university president; it is the right moment for this opportunity for my wife and I, and we are really excited to have been selected. Western has a great tradition of success and excellence and we look forward to being a part of that.”
