A new associate dean has been named to the largest of NIU’s degree-granting colleges.

Joseph E. Grush, current chair of the psychology department, was named the associate dean of the Liberal Arts and Sciences College.

Grush will succeed mathematician Peter Nicholls, who resigned earlier this year to become Arts and Science dean at Kansas State University at Manhattan.

“I am honored to be selected for this position,” Grush said. “I am interested in the challenges this position offers.”

The challenges regarding the budget constraints are intriguing, Grush said. “The state has not been keeping up with budget needs of the LA&S department, so it will be quite challenging to work out innovative and creative solutions to budgetary needs,” he said.

Grush is a 1967 summa cum laude graduate of Quincy College at Quincy where he earned his bachelor’s degree in philosophy and psychology. In 1974 he earned his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.

Grush was a nominee for an excellence in undergraduate teaching award in 1983.

Grush has published extensively and reviewed several psychology journals.

He has been a consultant for the DeKalb County Public Health Department and the Ben Gordon Mental Health Center.