Though John Hayes will be officially retiring from his position as the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the end of June, he won’t be leaving Pacific completely.
Beginning July 1, Hayes will become the director of the Center for a Sustainable Society, a center that he helped implement and create at Pacific.
Though the position is meant to be only half-time, Hayes said the center is going to take time in order for it to be successful, so he doubts he’ll stick to his half-time quota. According to Hayes, the purpose of the center is to “make this area of Washington County as sustainable as we can make it.”
The center will work with the Forest Grove campus sustainability committee, along with a large number of groups and organizations including town governments, school districts, clean water services and local businesses.
Hayes will make contact with these organizations and work with to better the sustainability practices in the county. When he takes over his new role, Hayes will move from his office in Berglund Hall to a new office in Scott Hall. In his new position, Hayes said that he will have the opportunity to work with more students, which was something he did not have as much opportunity to do as a dean.
As Hayes begins his new role as a director, Lisa Carstens will be stepping in to take over the role as the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. Hayes said that he is “ready to let go” and that he is turning the position over to good hands.
After spending 21 years as a dean, Hayes also said that he has fulfilled the position “long enough.” However, Hayes said he is proud of a few things that the College of Arts and Sciences has been able to accomplish in the nine years since he took the position.
Hayes said he is proud of the fact that 40 percent of the faculty are new, and he said the new hires are great faculty members as well as scholars.
The second accomplishment Hayes noted was the addition of the MFA in Writing program that was inducted in 2004. According to Hayes, it is the highest ranked program in the university and that the fact that it was created for 60 students, the program teaches 90.
Finally, Hayes said he is proud of the restructuring of the College of Arts and Sciences into three schools: arts and humanities, natural sciences and the social sciences. For Hayes, this change was particularly important to the college because it made it so there was more attention on curriculum with the addition of a director to each school. Hayes credits the restructuring for the addition of the new majors and minors to the college.
Despite his accomplishments, Hayes said there have been struggles along the way. During his time as dean, Hayes said he tried to implement more ethnical diversity into the faculty and the administration, but was unable to do so.
In addition to diversity, Hayes said the facilities across campus need attention. Though Hayes was dean during the building of the LEED certified buildings on campus, he said that the arts facilities needed work and the science department needed larger, better facilities as well. According to Hayes, the economic downturn put a damper on furthering these plans.
Hayes also noted that despite the upgrades to the Stoller Center, the building was still bursting at the seams. He noted that students needed more classroom space in the building and that athletics also needed more room.
“It’ll come,” said Hayes.
Though Hayes said that he would not miss the “unending stream of emails,” he said that he would miss “working with the people.”
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