Rankin Pledges To Divide Attention Across Campus In Provost Post

Students, faculty in humanities hopeful Rankin will improve support to their fields. By Quinn Kelley

Students, faculty in humanities hopeful Rankin will improve support to their fields.

By Quinn Kelley ,The Diamondback

Though incoming Provost Mary Ann Rankin has proven her success in the sciences, past concerns of an imbalance between STEM and humanities will have many students and faculty closely watching her first moves.
Officials said they are confident Rankin’s experiences, including serving as the University of Texas at Austin’s natural sciences college dean, will be an asset to the university when she assumes her post Oct. 1. Students and faculty in the humanities said they were looking forward to Rankin’s plans, but hope her appointment also signals a new era on the campus in which their fields receive adequate support to grow and succeed.

“There’s always some concern when people don’t have a background in your field, but I would hope that a person ... would be supportive of all dimensions of the university,” classics department Chair Lillian Doherty said.