Pharmacy dean stepping down; vice provost takes D.C. post

Two more search committees are forming on campus following announcements that Jack Fincham, dean of pharmacy, would step down as dean next June, and Robert Barnhill, vice provost for research and president of the KU Center for Research, has been named to a national research post.

Jack Fincham, dean of pharmacy.

Jack Fincham

Fincham, dean for the past nine years, will return to teaching and research once a new dean is named. Since coming to KU in 1994 as dean and professor, Fincham, a Marysville native, has led the school through a smooth transition from a five-year to a new six-year professional doctor of pharmacy degree program.

This spring KU's School of Pharmacy ranked third among all 85 schools of pharmacy nationwide in research funding from the National Institutes of Health. The third-place ranking was the highest the program has achieved in NIH funding, and in the previous five years, KU's School of Pharmacy consecutively ranked in the top 10. About 95 percent of the pharmacists in Kansas are graduates of the KU School of Pharmacy.

The School of Pharmacy is located on three campuses: the main campus in Lawrence, the Medical Center campus in Kansas City, Kan., and the Edwards Campus in Overland Park. The school's full-time faculty consists of approximately 55 members in four departments: pharmacology and toxicology, medicinal chemistry, pharmaceutical chemistry and pharmacy practice. KU offers graduate degrees in all four departments and in neurosciences. Pharmacy practice offers master's degrees; all others offer both master's and doctoral degrees.
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Robert Barnhill, vice provost for research

Robert Barnhill

Barnhill began a prestigious yearlong assignment Sept. 1 as the National Science Foundation/Council of Graduate Schools' dean-in-residence in Washington, D.C.
He will return to KU next fall as professor of mathematics and of electrical engineering and computer science. He also will serve as a KU Center for Research senior scholar.

When Barnhill arrived at KU's Lawrence campus six years ago, external research proposals had declined for two years in a row. Since then, research funding has doubled and KU's market share of federal and other funding has been among the fastest increasing in the nation. In fiscal year 2002, the most current figures available, KU's total research expenditures reached $243 million, an increase of 8.4 percent from the previous record of $224 million, set in fiscal year 2001. It also marked the sixth consecutive year that KU research expenditures increased.

Barnhill also initiated the Research!America poll of Kansas citizens' attitudes toward university research, which resulted in the state Legislature passing a research bonding bill in 2002 despite a serious budget crunch.

His assignment in Washington, D.C., is to help coordination between the two sponsoring organizations and improve collaboration between academic research and graduate education. In addition, he will work with his wife, Marigold Linton, who will continue as director of American Indian Outreach at KU, to increase the number of American Indians who prepare for careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

James A. Roberts, e'66, will serve as the interim vice provost this year. He has been associate vice provost since 1999. A fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, a national professional association, Roberts joined KU in 1990 as chair and professor of the electrical engineering and computer science department. He previously worked 21 years for TRW Inc., now owned by Northrop Grumman, and ESL Inc. in California and Colorado. Following his KU bachelor's degree, he earned a master's degree at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1968 and his doctorate in electrical engineering at Santa Clara University in 1979.