Travis Vail/ Roundup
The Pierce College faculty has currently filled 14 of 22 vacant positions for the fall semester, which include professorships in several departments, as well as a new grant writer and counselors.
Preliminary interviews began in March, wherein a faculty committee selected finalists to participate in a second interview with the campus president and relevant faculty members later on.
“These hires are the most important decision for any president to make,” said Vice President of Academic Affairs Nabil Abu-Ghazaleh. “We’ve been hiring between 15 and 25 faculty members per year for a few years now, and they’ve been good hires each year.
The hiring committee has selected a diverse group that includes former instructors at several major universities throughout the country.
Each of the new faculty members that were available for comment expressed their enthusiasm to join the staff at Pierce College.
“[Pierce College] has a very strong reputation, especially in mathematics,” said John Harland, who has instructed mathematics in several universities such as UCSD and California State University San Marcos. “Working with such innovative colleagues excites me.”
Abu-Ghazaleh estimates that the hiring process will not be complete until late September, but all instructional positions will be filled in-time for the upcoming semester.
“The group is pretty impressive,” said Abu-Ghazaleh. “What’s going on here will serve the school for decades to come.”