Divisional academic deans in American universities: their characteristics and administrative styles
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The divisional academic dean (one of a group of co-equal deans responsible to an academic vice-president or provost) has generally been overlooked in the literature on the deanship in American colleges and universities. This study was undertaken in order to provide an information base on divisional academic deans nation-wide, to ascertain the administrative styles to which such deans subscribe, and to develop a set of profiles of dean types. A systematic random sample of divisional deans was drawn from all American universities offering both undergraduate and graduate education and having the relevant organizational structure. A total of 254 divisional deans responded to a questionnaire consisting of twenty-five behavioral statements, evaluated in terms of the respondents' ideals for a department head, a divisional dean, and an academic vice-president, and twenty-nine items eliciting personal and job-related backgrounds; characteristics, and attitudes. The methodology used included (1) measures of central tendency and dispersion; (2) product-moment correlation; (3) chi-square tests of association; (4) analysis of variance; (5) discriminant analysis; (6) multiple regression analysis; (7) factor analysis; and (8) canonical correlation. The culmination of the data analysis involved higher order factor analysis of respondents' scores on administrative style factors and "base factor" scores, to yield profiles of extremist types of deans; and canonical correlation of the same sets of factor scores to yield roots interpreted as profiles of archetypes of deans. On the basis of the behavioral statements presented in the questionnaire, eight administrative styles were identified by factor analysis and labeled (1) Company Man; (2) Democrat; (3) Institutional P. R. Man; (4) Passive Goodfellow; (5) Mr. Faculty; (6) Lofty Scholar-Administrator; (7) Activist Academician; and (8) Parochial Patriarch. Factor analysis of other variables produced six base factors labeled (1) Rate of Advancement; (2) Morale; (3) Ambition; (4) Seniority; (5) Academic Politics; and (6) Prestige..