Candidates Marley, Staben on campus midweek

First two of six presidential candidates visit campus Nov. 12-14

The first two of six candidates for president of UND, Dr. Robert Marley and Dr. Chuck Staben, are visiting campus during the middle part of this week.

Candidate visits started Tuesday, Nov. 12, and will continue through Thursday, Nov. 21. The Presidential Search Committee will meet Friday, Nov. 22, to select at least three finalists to forward to the State Board of Higher Education. Those finalists will meet with the Board on Tuesday, Dec. 3, and UND’s new president is expected to be named that day.

Forums have been scheduled for students, faculty, staff, and the campus and community for each candidate.

Dr. Robert Marley forum schedule, Nov. 13

Dr. Robert J. Marley is a Professor of Engineering Management and Former Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, Missouri University of Science and Technology. His visit to campus began on Tuesday, Nov. 12.

• Staff Forum: 9 – 10:15 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 13, 100 Leonard Hall
• Student Forum: noon – 1:15 p.m., Wednesday, Nov. 13, 114 Witmer Hall
• Campus and Community Forum: 2:30 – 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 13, Room E101, School of Medicine & Health Sciences. A meet-and-greet social will follow. The forum will be live-streamed and available to the campus community. An NDUS login will be required.

Dr. Chuck Staben forum schedule, Nov. 13 and 14

Dr. Chuck Staben is a Professor of Biology and Former President of the University of Idaho.

• Faculty Forum: 10:30 – 11:45 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 13, Gorecki Alumni Center
• Staff Forum: 9 – 10:15 a.m. Thursday, Nov. 14, Room 7, Education Building
• Student Forum: noon – 1:15 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 14, 114 Witmer Hall
• Campus and Community Forum: 2:30 – 3:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 14, Discovery Room, EERC. A meet-and-greet social will follow.

Parking information

Parking Services encourages you to arrive early; there are a limited number of spaces which will not require a parking permit during the candidate forums. Parking enforcement will be active for all other lots. If you have any questions, please call Parking Services at 701.777.3551 or email parking@und.edu .

• Education Building: Parking Ramp (Passport spots levels 1,4,5) and Starcher lot
• EERC: EERC west parking lot
• Gorecki Alumni Center: Chester Fritz north parking lot
• Leonard Hall: Parking ramp (passport spots levels 1,4,5) and Starcher lot
• School of Medicine & Health Sciences: SMHS parking lots (excluding Passport)
• Witmer Hall: Parking ramp (Passport spots levels 1,4,5) and Starcher lot

Campus open forum live-stream

The campus and community open forum will be live-streamed. Entrance is restricted to users with activated UND Zoom accounts who are UND students, faculty and staff. If you wish to join the webinar, go to und.zoom.us and log into Zoom with your IDM credentials prior to logging into the webinar. Join the forum from a PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone or Android device at https://und.zoom.us/j/800358104.

Candidate feedback/survey forms

The Presidential Search Committee encourages you to fill out feedback/visit survey forms, which will be available from 7:30 a.m. to midnight while the candidate is on campus for their two-day visit. Please note that the visit surveys are only active during that time period for each candidate.

About Dr. Robert Marley

Dr. Robert Marley currently serves as the Robert B. Koplar Professor of Engineering Management at the Missouri University of Science and Technology.  Marley possesses 34 years of experience in serving research universities, including 23 years in a variety of leadership roles.  These include service as an academic dean, as vice president for student success, and as provost.  University areas that he has had specific leadership responsibility for include faculty and student affairs, college and support programs, research and sponsored programs, technology transfer, distance and on-line programs, libraries, enrollment management, registrar, financial aid, and even briefly Division I athletics.

In these capacities, Marley has a successful record of enhancing student and faculty success, prestigious national and international awards, increases in enrollment and retention, research growth, increases in faculty and student diversity, and significant growth of private support.  He has helped garner approximately $115 million in new private, state and federal support for professorships, programs and facilities.  Other results include the creation of a new College structure, with the appointment of founding academic deans, as well as the creation of a comprehensive support program for faculty excellence, at S&T.   His efforts on behalf of both S&T and Montana State helped lead to enhanced profiles for both institutions, including the ascent of MSU to the R1 classification (very high research activity) of the Carnegie rankings, initially in 2006.

Marley began his professional career as a rehabilitation engineering technician at the Cerebral Palsy Research Foundation, where he helped design adaptive technologies for severely disabled adults.  In 1990, he joined Montana State University-Bozeman in the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department.  He went on to hold positions as Associate Dean, and then Dean of the College of Engineering, and later as Vice President of Student Success.  From 2014 to 2019, Marley served as the Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor at the Missouri University of Science and Technology in Rolla.

In 2012 Marley was selected as a Fellow in the prestigious American Council on Education (ACE) Fellows Program for leadership development, where he was placed at Texas A&M University in College Station.  Among other activities, he studied models of relationships between a flagship public research university and other state campuses operating in a mission-diverse system.

In his faculty role, Marley pursued research questions in ergonomics and human factors engineering, work-related cumulative trauma injury and performance.  He is author of over 100 publications with impact in ergonomics, engineering and safety-related disciplines, and has several citations in key federal compendiums in these areas.  In the role of Koplar Professor, he examines leadership development issues in complex organizations, particularly for under-represented minorities.  Marley has garnered local and national awards as a faculty mentor and has co-authored a widely used textbook, including a Spanish language edition.

Marley holds a Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from Wichita State University, where he was also awarded the University’s highly selective Boeing Fellowship (1988 to 1990).  His Bachelors and Masters degrees are also from Wichita State.  He and his wife, Margaret Maben, who holds a BS in Microbiology, reside in Rolla, Missouri, where they enjoy many outdoor activities together.

About Dr. Chuck Staben

Chuck Staben served as President of the University of Idaho from March 2014 to June 2019. During his tenure at U of I, the university excelled in its mission for student success, research, and community impact, achieving new highs in student retention and graduation, a 25 percent increase in extramural research funding, and record fundraising.

Under Staben’s leadership, the state of Idaho instituted a novel Direct Admissions process to facilitate college-going among Idaho residents. Collaborating with the governor, State Board of Education, and Legislature, Dr. Staben initiated increases in need-based financial aid for all Idaho students by 50 percent. Dr. Staben also led the doubling of cohort sizes for Idaho residents in U of I’s WWAMI Medical Education Program and the development of all new medical education facilities. The university’s College of Law expanded its reach to a full three-year program in Boise in addition to the established program on the home campus in Moscow.

In addition to increased research funding, changes in intellectual property and contracting practices deepened the University’s relationships with high-technology industries. Novel licensing agreements enhanced revenue and relationships with industry. The University also broadened participation in research and scholarship by creating a successful office of undergraduate research and a popular series of “5-minute” interdisciplinary seminars.

Dr. Staben’s diversity work was assisted by active engagement with the Native American Advisory Council and by the Latino Advisory Council he established. Staben’s work to provide in-state tuition to regional tribal members and distance education in fisheries management to serve tribal needs was recognized by honor blankets and ceremonies from regional tribes. The Latino Advisory Council improved community college transfer processes and established the Caminos al Futuro grade 8-12 pathways programs, for which Staben was recognized by the Idaho Commission on Hispanic Affairs as its “Friend of the Year” in 2016.

Dr. Staben led a $52 million arena and events center project from planning, to fundraising, to groundbreaking. The arena, the university’s first major new Athletics facility since 1976, is a novel, engineered mass-timber project undertaken in collaboration with Idaho’s forest products industries. A major research dairy plan also developed during his tenure moved from design, to fundraising, to securing site locations.

Dr. Staben’s innovation was recognized by his invitation to membership on the Council on Competitiveness. His leadership stems from a passion for the mission of higher education and a belief in the unique role of public research universities to change lives, lead discovery and innovation, and foster success for their communities.

Prior to serving as President at the University of Idaho, Dr. Staben was Provost at the University of South Dakota from 2009 to 2014. USD saw record enrollment, rapid growth in distance education, a dramatic increase in retention and graduation rates, and a doubling of extramural research in the Provost area. Dr. Staben began his career at the University of Kentucky as a biology professor, becoming department chair, Associate Vice President for Research, and serving as Acting Vice President for Research, overseeing a $250 million research effort.

Dr. Staben was born in Waukegan, Illinois and received his BS in Biochemistry at the University of Illinois, and a Ph.D. in Biochemistry at the University of California-Berkeley. He held postdoctoral fellowships at Chiron Corporation, a successful biotechnology startup, and at Stanford University. He has held research grants from the National Institutes of Health; the National Science Foundation, including a Course and Curriculum Development grant; and other agencies. Chuck and his wife, Dr. Mary Beth Staben, a practicing physician, have three adult children.