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BRIDGET O'BRIEN/Daily Bruin Senior Staff DANIEL NEUMAN

Current position: Dean of the School of Arts and Architecture since 1996

Other positions held: Professor of ethnomusicology at UCLA;

Director, University of Washington School of Music

Education: University of Illinois, B.A. and Ph.D. in anthropology

Interests: Specialized in musical traditions of India; Proficient with the sarangi, an Indian bowed instrument; Loves good coffee and coffee house discussions

By Kelly Rayburn

DAILY BRUIN SENIOR STAFF

krayburn@media.ucla.edu

Hello, Neuuuuman – UCLA has found its future number two man.

Chancellor Albert Carnesale announced Daniel Neuman, the dean of UCLA’s School of Arts and Architecture, as the university’s next executive vice chancellor Tuesday.

As EVC, Neuman will serve as UCLA’s chief operating officer and will act as chancellor in Carnesale’s absence. He will play a key role in defining budgetary and development priorities, a job that is especially important given a multi-billion dollar state budget shortfall and the expected influx of 4,000 students to UCLA in the next 10 years.

Current EVC Rory Hume announced in January he is leaving UCLA for Australia, where he will serve as president and vice chancellor at the University of New South Wales next year.

Neuman’s appointment is effective July 1, pending approval from the UC Regents.

“I’m extremely delighted and honored and – to use a word I rarely use – thrilled ... it’s an occasion of joy,” Neuman said, taking a break from a small celebration in his office.

Upon announcing the appointment, Carnesale said he is “extremely excited to work even more closely with Dean Neuman.”

Neuman will not take office in optimal times. Addressing tough allocation decisions in tight budgetary times will be his most pressing short-term task, he said.

Though he felt it would be premature to outline specific budget priorities right now, Neuman said he would be able to articulate a more concrete series of priorities in September or October, after a few months on the job.

Establishing a longer-term goal, Neuman would like to see UCLA more intimately “engage in and embrace” the metropolis around it, working with the rest of Los Angeles to address the arts, social problems and medicine.

Neuman also expressed interest in continuing Hume’s efforts to make UCLA a center of technological development.

Under Hume’s watch, the university established California NanoSystems Institute, a joint effort between UCLA and UC Santa Barbara to apply the nanometer scale structure to biomedical research and manufacturing.

Neuman called such technology both fascinating and important.

“I’ve been nicknamed the techno-dean,” he said.

Neuman’s deep affection for UCLA is one reason he looks forward to being the school’s second-in-command – and a love for a huge institution is something new for someone coming from a time when people distrusted them, he said.

“I’m from the ’60s. I’m one of those people,” he explained.

The appointment of the EVC is only one of a number of key administrative and faculty changes the university is enduring.

Currently, the positions of vice chancellor of Student Affairs, dean of the Henry Samueli School of Engineering – and now the dean of the School of Arts and Architecture – are vacated. Additionally, two associate vice chancellors were appointed last week to address diversity and community partnerships.

With so many appointments taking place or about to take place, the university has opportunities to go in completely new directions. Neuman again said he did not want to make premature determinations about decisions he would make as EVC, but he did say he looked forward to getting to know the people he will be working with and re-thinking the creative aspects of the job.

The transition will be difficult at times, he said. Though he looks forward to working with Carnesale and the other vice chancellors, Neuman said it would take time for his future co-workers to learn his “habits, customs, idiosyncrasies, orientations, biases and interests.”

Having earned both bachelor’s and doctoral degrees in anthropology at the University of Illinois, the musicology professor has conducted extensive field work in India over the last three decades. He is proficient in playing the sarangi, an Indian bowed instrument.

In addition, Neuman has played the violin, takes interest in maps and mapmaking, does film-editing and Web page publishing and loves good coffee and coffee-house discussions.

He would love to see UCLA be a more public, community-enhancing space where students and faculty sit and challenge each other’s assumptions.

Promoting this type of “classical” academy comes second in many people’s minds to providing adequate classroom and office space.

But public spaces for public discussions – like coffee houses – should not be considered a “luxurious after-thought,” he said.

Neuman acknowledged that such a vague goal may be out of his capacity as EVC.

“Maybe I’ll push for more coffee shops more than the other vice chancellors,” he quipped. “The joke is always about ‘Neuman’s coffee houses.’”