Office of Dean of the Faculty Records, 1781-2016

The Subject Files series contains the general subject files of the Office of the Dean of the Faculty. Most topics of interest to the dean and the office staff are reflected in the files in this series. Topics include the general well-being of the faculty and their benefits, regulations, responsibilities, leadership, and recruitment; the well-being of the professional research, technical, and library staffs; special academic programs, exchanges, and consortiums; the relations between the academic side of the University and the administration, supporting offices, trustees, students, and alumni; academic and teaching statistics; and the dean's role in University administration in general and particularly regarding academic planning. Files containing information about individual identified students are restricted for seventy-five years.

The Teaching Schedules series contains the teaching schedules of each faculty member, by department, from 1936 to 1966. Schedules indicate the classes taught be each member of the faculty, the number of hours spent in the classroom weekly, faculty on leave, number of Ph.D.s supervised, and other university roles such as committees, program directorships, and leadership positions.

1 item

Description:

The Faculty Files series consists of the personnel files of nearly every faculty member, many administrators and professional staff, and some trustees. The files transferred to Mudd Library in 1996 and before are indexed and are searchable using the <a href="https://rbsc.princeton.edu/databases/faculty-and-professional-staff-index">Faculty and Professional Staff Index, 1764-2006</a>.

Arranged alphabetically within each accession group.

Series 7: Audio Recordings of Faculty Meetings, 1993-2016

3 boxes

Description:

Series 7 consists of audio recordings of faculty meetings.

Series 8: Public Lecture Recordings and Files consists of video recordings of Public Lectures as well as audio recordings of the Public Lecture Committee and a small number of files related to the lecture program.

1 item

Description:

Series 9: Public Website provides information for current and prospective faculty members about employment-related policies and procedures as well as specialized information for subsets of Dean of the Faculty staff including librarians, postdocs and academic professionals. In addition, the website contains lists of on endowed professorships, fellowships and prizes.

The original arrangement of the files was maintained.

Series 10: Chairs' Guidebook and Numbered Memoranda, 2000-2016

417 digital files

Description:

Series 10: Chairs' Guidebook and Numbered Memoranda contains a guidebook for department chairs as well as memoranda made available to the faculty through a password-protected website. The guidebook is available in both Microsoft Word format and PDF format, whereas the numbered memoranda are available only in PDF. The memos pertain primarily to changes to or reemphasis of the Rules and Procedures of the Faculty. Academic years 2000-2003 contain only outlines for that year's memos.

The memoranda are arranged chronologically by year.

Chairs' Guidebook, 2016

12 digital files

Numbered Memoranda, 2000-2016

405 digital files

Scope and Contents

The Princeton University Office of the Dean of the Faculty Records consists of the files of the dean, the office's staff, as well as the faculty. In addition to the office's subject files, the collection holds the records of the faculty meetings, faculty and University committees, and the personnel files of faculty, senior staff, and trustees.

Series 1 (Faculty Meetings and Minutes) and most of Series 3 (Committees of the Faculty and the University) were actually created by the faculty and its designees (the secretary of the faculty for series 1 and the secretaries or chairs of committees, for series 3), not by the Office of the Dean of the Faculty. The dean's office does, however, lend office support to the faculty and maintains these records before they are transferred to the University Archives.

The remaining series (with the exception of Series 9, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty's archived website) consist of files were created by the dean's office for its own use. These series are particularly appropriate for research into the benefits and regulations concerning the faculty and professional staffs, faculty and department schedules and statistics, details about individual trustees and faculty and staff members, special academic programs and circumstances (such as teaching during wartime), cooperation between academic departments and with other universities, and the role of the dean of the faculty in the administration of the University.

Please see series descriptions in the contents list for additional information about individual series.

The dean of the faculty is Princeton University's oldest deanship, established in 1883 to relieve elderly President James McCosh of some of the administration's more taxing but less high-profile responsibilities. These responsibilities were defined by the trustees as "whatever does not pertain directly to the work of instruction, such in particular as the discipline of the College, the assignment of rooms and the sanitary condition of the Institution." When these duties were passed to the newly-established dean of the college in 1909, the dean of the faculty became responsible for matters relating to faculty and curriculum.

In the 1940s and 1950s, the dean of the college took on more responsibility for the oversight of undergraduate academic life, while the dean of the faculty became increasingly focused on the well-being of the faculty and the quality of instruction. In the early 1940s, Dean of the Faculty Robert K. Root's primary concerns were maintaining sound academic requirements for undergraduates, facilitating a quick course of study (so that students could graduate early and enlist), coordinating faculty leave for assisting the war effort and for other reasons, the effect of the war on student scholastic achievement, and student enrollment and attendance.

By the mid-1950s, however, the issues of central concern to Dean of the Faculty J. Douglas Brown were faculty and department-related. In 1956, he described the progress his office had made in his first ten years on the job in the following areas: faculty recruitment efforts, advancement procedures, the ongoing effort to appoint more assistant professors instead of instructors, salary rates, retirement and insurance plans, housing and other fringe benefits, the establishment of preceptorships and fellowships, and research administration. He was also proud of his work to expand or improve individual academic departments and schools. The initiative for these changes typically originated with the faculty, however, and was then supported by the dean and the University administration. The dean continued to work on curricular issues, but since the Second World War, the concerns of the dean of the faculty clearly shifted from the undergraduate academic experience to instructional oversight and faculty development. Until the creation of the position of provost in 1966, the dean of the faculty was also responsible for taking on the duties of the president in his absence.

By the mid-1990s, Dean of the Faculty Amy Gutmann was concerned with both the faculty and the professional research, technical, and library staffs of the University. Gutmann's office worked on issues related to faculty recruitment (especially of women and underrepresented minorities), rules changes, teaching initiatives, retirement, reviews of academic departments, internet use, and faculty honors. Issues related to the professional staffs included general personnel administration, appointments and advancements, salaries, and immigration. In her annual report of 1995-1996, Gutmann makes no mention of undergraduate academic life or the curriculum-subjects of crucial importance to her predecessors of the first half of the twentieth century.

Princeton's faculty, the creator of series 1 and most of series 3, has long been responsible for the determination of major University policies. With the president presiding, the faculty oversees functions as diverse as admissions, curriculum, instruction, research, discipline, examinations, standing, and extracurricular life, and advises the president on faculty appointments and advancements. According to Dean of the Faculty J. Douglas Brown, "The educational policies of the University have long been the product of thorough study and lively debate by a faculty which through these orderly procedures assumes an unusual degree of concern and responsibility. The president and deans exercise their influence upon these policies far more through their leadership in the faculty and its committees than through any assumption of ex officio authority." Unlike most other research universities, Princeton's professors have remained one faculty over the years (except for a few years at the turn of the twentieth century), instead of dividing into schools or colleges with different policies and priorities. The Princeton faculty has proven to be cohesive, active in University governance, and influential.

Most deans of the faculty were appointed after serving a number of years on the Princeton faculty, usually with significant experience as a department or committee chair. Deans of the faculty are chosen in part because they have earned the trust, respect, and admiration of both their faculty colleagues and University administrators. Deans of the faculty remain faculty members and sometimes continue to teach classes during their tenures as dean.

Deans of the Faculty, Department, Tenure as Dean

James Ormsbee Murray, English, 1883-1899

Samuel Ross Winans, Greek, 1899-1903

Henry Burchard Fine, mathematics, 1903-1912

William Francis Magie, physics, 1912-1925

Luther Pfahler Eisenhart, mathematics, 1925-1933

Robert Kilburn Root, English, 1933-1946

James Douglas Brown, economics, 1946-1967

Robert Roswell Palmer, history, 1967-1968

Richard Allen Lester, economics, 1968-1973

Aaron Lemonick, physics, 1973-1989

Robert C. Gunning, mathematics, 1989-1995

Amy Gutmann, politics, 1995-1997

Joseph H. Taylor, physics, 1997-2003

David P. Dobkin, computer science, 2003-2014

Deborah Prentice, psychology and public affairs, 2014-2017

Sanjeev R. Kulkarni, electrical engineering, 2017-2021

Arrangement

Files are arranged alphabetically within series, unless otherwise noted.

Collection Creator Biography:

Princeton University. Office of the Dean of Faculty

Princeton University's Dean of the Faculty is the senior administrator responsible for the quality and well-being of the faculty and professional staff of the university.

Acquisition:: This collection has been transferred to the University Archives in periodic installments for decades.
Accruals: Periodic transfers of general records from the Office of the Dean of the Faculty are expected indefinitely; personnel files are transferred annually and added to series 6.
Appraisal: No information on appraisal is available.
Processing Information: Processed by Matthew Reeder, Rosalba D. Varallo, Shannon DeVore '07, Page Dykstra '06, Lindsey Huddle '07, and Christina McMillan '07. Finding aid written by Matthew Reeder. Box 153 added by Christie Peterson with assistance from Suchi Mandavilli '14 in December 2010. Series 9 added by Lynn Durgin in December 2015. Finding aid updated by Annalise Berdini in February 2018.

Conditions Governing Access

Access restrictions to materials in this collection are determined by the dean of the faculty in consultation with the university archivist. The written permission of the dean of the faculty is required by anyone who wishes to view closed material.

Subseries 1A: the pre-July 1984 minutes are closed for 75 years; the remaining minutes are open for immediate research.

Subseries 1B: this subseries is open for research use.

Subseries 1C: the materials pertaining to pre-July 1984 meetings are closed for 75 years; the materials pertaining to all meetings held since are closed for 30 years.

Subseries 1D: this subseries is closed for 75 years. Subseries 1E: Faculty Memorial Resolutions is open for research.

Series 2: this series is closed for 30 years. Some folders are closed for 75 years; these folders are marked with large, red flags and indicated on the folder list.

Series 3: this series is closed for 30 years. Some folders are closed for 75 years; these folders are marked with large, red flags and indicated on the folder list.

Series 4: this series is closed for 30 years. Some folders are closed for 75 years; these folders are marked with large, red flags and indicated on the folder list.

Series 5: this series is open.

Series 6: Faculty and Professional Staff Files are closed until 100 years after the person's year of birth or 5 years after the person's year of death, whichever is longer.

Series 7: materials in this series are closed for 25 years from the date of their creation.

Series 9: Public Website is open for research use.

Series 10: this series is closed for 30 years from the date of creation of the record.

Conditions Governing Use

Single copies may be made for research purposes. To cite or publish quotations that fall within Fair Use, as defined under U. S. Copyright Law, no permission is required. The Trustees of Princeton University hold copyright to all materials generated by Princeton University employees in the course of their work. For instances beyond Fair Use, if copyright is held by Princeton University, researchers do not need to obtain permission, complete any forms, or receive a letter to move forward with use of materials from the Princeton University Archives.

For instances beyond Fair Use where the copyright is not held by the University, while permission from the Library is not required, it is the responsibility of the researcher to determine whether any permissions related to copyright, privacy, publicity, or any other rights are necessary for their intended use of the Library's materials, and to obtain all required permissions from any existing rights holders, if they have not already done so. Princeton University Library's Special Collections does not charge any permission or use fees for the publication of images of materials from our collections, nor does it require researchers to obtain its permission for said use. The department does request that its collections be properly cited and images credited. More detailed information can be found on the Copyright, Credit and Citations Guidelines page on our website. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us through the Ask Us! form.

Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements

For preservation reasons, original analog and digital media may not be read or played back in the reading room. Users may visually inspect physical media but may not remove it from its enclosure. All analog audiovisual media must be digitized to preservation-quality standards prior to use. Audiovisual digitization requests are processed by an approved third-party vendor. Please note, the transfer time required can be as little as several weeks to as long as several months and there may be financial costs associated with the process. Requests should be directed through the Ask Us Form.

This collection contains records created and used on computing devices. Researchers are responsible for meeting the technical requirements needed to access these materials, including any and all hardware and software.

Credit this material:

Office of Dean of the Faculty Records; Princeton University Archives, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library

Permanent URL:

http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/h415p9538

Location:

Princeton University Archives

Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library

65 Olden Street

Princeton, NJ 08540, USA

(609) 258-6345

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Storage Note:

Mudd Manuscript Library (scamudd): Boxes 1-157; S-000272; S-000273

Related Materials

The records of various University administrative offices, academic departments, organizations, and committees relate to, and sometimes overlap with, this collection. Of particular interest may be the Office of the President Records, the Office of the Provost Records, the Office of the Secretary Records, and the Office of the Dean of the College Records. Yearly annual reports to the president have, from the early 1940s to the present, included reports from the dean of the faculty. These reports, held in the University Archives at Mudd Library reveal the most important responsibilities and accomplishments of the office of the dean from year to year.

Notebooks kept by Katherine Rohrer while she worked as Associate Dean of Faculty between 1993 and 2001 can be found in AC195, Office of the Provost Records, Subseries 11H.

Other Finding Aids

Records described in Series 6 Faculty, Staff, and Trustee Personnel Files are indexed in a searchable database: Faculty and Professional Staff Index, 1764-2006.

These records may also be found in finding aids for each subgroup of the Faculty and Staff Professional Files:

Subgroup 1: A is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 1: A.

Subgroup 2: B is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 2: B.

Subgroup 3: C is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 3: C.

Subgroup 4: E is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 4: E.

Subgroup 5: F is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 5: F.

Subgroup 6: G is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 6: G.

Subgroup 7: H is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 7: H.

Subgroup 8: I-K is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 8: I-K.

Subgroup 9: L is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 9: L.

Subgroup 10: M is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 10: M.

Subgroup 11: N is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 11: N.

Subgroup 12: O is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 12: O.

Subgroup 13: P is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 13: P.

Subgroup 14: R-S is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 14: R-S.

Subgroup 15: T-W is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 15: T-W.

Subgroup 16: Other, Unknown, and Multiple Departments is available at Faculty and Professional Staff Files 1764-2014, Subgroup 16: Other, Unknown, and Multiple Departments.

Full text searching of this collection's archived website(s) is available through the Archive-It interface.

Bibliography

A 1974 dissertation studying the creation of the position of dean of the faculty at the College of New Jersey (Princeton University), and the campus climate that led to it (call number LD4616.R676 1974) is held at Mudd Library. The dissertation was written for the education department at Rutgers by Michael Louis Rosenthal and is entitled, The Founding of the Office of the Dean of the Faculty: Undergraduate Life at the College of New Jersey: An Anthropological View of History.

In the composition of this finding aid's history section, the following works were consulted: Articles titled "Faculty" by J. Douglas Brown and "Dean of the Faculty" in Alexander Leitch's A Princeton Companion (Princeton University Press, 1978); Annual reports to the president from the dean of the faculty; Michael Louis Rosenthal's 1974 Rutgers dissertation, The Founding of the Office of the Dean of the Faculty: Undergraduate Life at the College of New Jersey: An Anthropological View of History.

Subject Terms:

College administrators.
Education and state.
Education, Higher--New Jersey.
Educators--New Jersey--Princeton--Reports.
Educators--New Jersey--Princeton. -- Correspondence

Genre Terms:

Born digital.
Correspondence
Memorabilia.
Reports.
Web sites.

Names:

Princeton University
Brown, J. Douglas (James Douglas) (1898-1986)
Eisenhart, Luther Pfahler (1876-1965)
Fine, Henry B. (Henry Burchard) (1858-1928)
Gunning, Robert C. (Robert Clifford) (1931)
Lemonick, Aaron (1923)
Lester, Richard Allen (1908-1997)
Magie, William Francis (1858-1943)
Murray, James O. (James Ormsbee) (1827-1899)
Palmer, R.R. (Robert Roswell) (1909-2002)
Root, Robert K. (Robert Kilburn) (1877-1950)
Winans, Samuel Ross (1855-1910)