By 
By DANIELLE MILLER
Staff Writer
The decision has been made regarding the new chancellor of IU South Bend—Terry Allison will be officially appointed by the board of trustees in IU Bloomington on April 11. He will take his position as chancellor on July 1.
Allison says student retention will be a first priority after he becomes chancellor.
“I would like to engage the staff in South Bend to determine if we would like to try something different. We first need to understand the barriers to retention. If students enroll in more units their first year they will stick with it because they feel they are making progress,” he said.
He also said that the amount of graduate programs at the university is quite low even for a regional campus, and feels there could be some unmet needs in the community that can be fulfilled with the addition of applicable programs.
Across the nation, high costs for higher education have been a concern for students. Allison hopes to position IU South Bend students favorably when it comes to after-graduation debt.
“I want to see if students could leave with no debt – at least educational expenses,” he said.
IUSB South Bend may also expect to see more health programs added to campus.
“What struck me about South Bend is the relatively high number of health facilities but not programs at IU South Bend,” said Allison.
Despite the concerns overall, Allison is looking forward to becoming the leader of our campus.
“It’s a smooth-running campus, it seems there are good things going on, the chancellor and student initiatives have placed the campus in a good position for the future and the facilities are in good shape,” he said.
Throughout the open forums during the chancellor search in January, Allison mentioned several times that he enjoys connecting with students. He plans to continue this despite his demanding new position as chancellor.
“I plan to be very connected to students. I have a responsibility to connect to the community but I want to spend time with the students as well. I volunteered to mentor one of our students [at Governor’s State University] and I really like that part of my job. You will see me at a lot of performing arts programs because I really like that,” he said.
Even though he does not officially take office until July, Allison hopes to be on campus a few times before then to meet with Chancellor Reck and other staff members.
