Trustees to approve dean of social work

By Craig Chamberlain

Jill Doner Kagle will be named dean of the UI School of Social Work on the
Urbana-Champaign campus by the UI Board of Trustees at its meeting today in
Urbana.

Kagle, whose appointment takes effect immediately, has been acting dean
since February 1993, when Paula Allen-Meares, left to take a similar
position at the University of Michigan. Kagle will continue to hold the
rank of professor in the school.

In announcing the appointment, Larry R. Faulkner, campus provost and vice
chancellor for academic affairs, cited Kagle's accomplishments over the
previous 20 months, her vision for the future and her record and
connections within the social-work community.

"She has served extremely well as acting dean during a complicated period
of the school's life," Faulkner said. Her appointment began in the middle
of restructuring discussions - at the state and university level - that
proposed moving or consolidating the School of Social Work, he said.
Neither of those options is still under consideration.

"She has excellent ideas about how the school can serve the people of
Illinois while maintaining very strong educational and research programs,"
Faulkner said. "I share her enthusiasm for the vision she has projected and
look forward to working with her to realize it."

Kagle, the president of the Illinois chapter of the National Association of
Social Workers, "is very well connected in the social-work community for
the things that need to be done right now," Faulkner said.

She has worked extensively during her term as acting dean to bring
professional training and other assistance to the Illinois Department of
Children and Family Services. "That's an example," Kagle said, "of what
we'd like to do with other departments in the state."

Kagle said she wants to continue to emphasize the role the school has
played in professionalizing social-service agencies in the state, and in
providing greater access to graduate social work education. To do that, the
school will continue its current program of offering first-year graduate
education in two different communities each year, she said.

Kagle earned her bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of
Michigan, and her doctorate from the UI.

She began her academic career at Illinois State University in 1971, and
joined the UI faculty in 1978.