UNC picks School of Civic Life & Leadership dean. He leads a similar program at Duke.

A little over a year after the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees directed university leaders to develop a School of Civic Life and Leadership, the new school now has its inaugural dean.

The university’s governing board voted Friday to hire Jed Atkins for the job, starting March 28.

Atkins, an associate professor of classical studies at Duke University, also directs the Civil Discourse Project at Duke. That program’s mission is to “promote civil discourse through modeling or teaching the capacities and virtues necessary to engage in healthy exchange across difference.”

Atkins is a scholar of “Greek and Roman political and moral philosophy, the history of political thought, and contemporary debates on tolerance, civility and civil discourse,” a UNC news release said Friday. UNC interim Chancellor Lee Roberts said Atkins’ “deep and long-standing commitment to civil discourse and civic education makes him an ideal leader for the new school.”

“At a time of increasing polarization and declining public trust in our institutions, the development of [the School of Civic Life and Leadership] represents a remarkable opportunity for America’s first public university to continue to lead our country in preparing ‘a rising generation’ for lives of thoughtful civic engagement required for a flourishing democracy,” Atkins said in a statement Friday.

The hire marks the latest development in the rapid development of the school, which is officially intended to foster and teach skills in public discourse and civic engagement to students.

A group of nine inaugural faculty members for the school was announced in October. It drafted the school’s first minor, in civic life and leadership, which is expected to launch next semester.

Trustee Marty Kotis said Friday the fast-paced creation of the school and the hiring of Atkins was proof of “what happens when you cut through red tape and you have a level playing field.”

“The board worked with the provost and the university overall to accomplish this and accelerate it,” Kotis said. “And a lot of people said this couldn’t be done in the time frame we were talking about, and it has been.”

Faculty involvement in the school’s development

The school has been a point of contention at the university since trustees first proposed it last January, particularly for faculty.

Faculty, including then-faculty chair Mimi Chapman, have said they were not informed about the school ahead of the trustees’ announcement in January, which is contrary to traditional shared governance structures at the university, in which faculty direct the curriculum and propose new academic units.

Some faculty have also questioned potential political motives behind the school. In the days after the Board of Trustees approved a resolution calling for the school last January, Dave Boliek, the then-board chair, touted the school as a way to “remedy” a shortage of “right-of-center views” at the university and among faculty.

Boliek said Friday “the campus community has embraced the idea” of the school and its stated purpose over the past year.

State lawmakers were also involved in the development of the school, with the state budget, passed in September, giving the school $2 million in each of the next two fiscal years and directing the university to hire between 10 and 20 faculty members from outside the university to teach in the school.

At an October faculty meeting, the dean of the university’s College of Arts & Sciences — where the School of Civic Life and Leadership will be housed — said concerns about legislative and political “influence” over the school were “valid,” and that he hoped faculty and university leaders would be “given the time and space needed to show what we can do at this great university.”

Trustee Perrin Jones, who had previously tried to quell “some hardening of lines” regarding the school and its development, said Friday that Atkins’ hiring was “a truly momentous day for our university, our state, our nation and our civil society.”

“This is an example of what this great university can achieve when we are aligned in purpose and cohesive in action,” Jones said.