Four people are vying to take over for University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Jon Wiley at the helm of the nation’s 10th largest university when he steps down in September. One candidate is Cornell’s own Provost Biddy Martin.

U.W. System President Kevin Reilly named Martin a finalist for the position on Wednesday, signifying that she has made one of the last cuts in the chancellor search.

Last week, five faculty members were added to the list of yearly recipients of the Provost’s Awards for Distinguished Scholarship in recognition of their outstanding research and scholarship and the hope of keeping them at the University.

The sum of $30,000 was awarded to this year’s winners: Professors Charles Brittain, classics and philosophy; Carlos Bustamante, biological statistics and computational biology; Jonathan Kirshner, government; Hod Lipson, mechanical and aerospace engineering; and Michelle Wang, physics.

According to Provost Biddy Martin, every year the deans of the academic units nominate faculty members, and the provost’s staff makes the final selections.

In a speech that was at times solemn and at others lighthearted, Provost Biddy Martin discussed Cornell’s role within higher education yesterday afternoon in Call Auditorium. Her second annual Academic State of the University focused on how Cornell stacks up against the trends in what she called “the golden age” of higher education.

Last year Martin focused on many of the challenges that Cornell faced, including the replacement of retiring faculty, making innovative changes to the curriculum and insuring diversity in all facets of the University.

Alan Paau, assistant vice chancellor for technology transfer and intellectual property services at the University of California at San Diego, has been named vice provost for technology transfer and economic development and the executive director of the Cornell Center for Technology, Enterprise and Commercialization, the University announced yesterday.

Paau, who has been the leader of the technology transfer office at UCSD since 1998, will be the first person to hold this new vice provost title at Cornell.

This summer the University bid farewell to four of its top officers, backtracking on decades of growth by the administration. This was a move we anticipated, and one we will not be quick to criticize. The creation of these posts initially was the byproduct an era of superfluous spending at Cornell — an era that bears little resemblance to the current state of affairs.

According to Provost Kent Fuchs, the elimination of these positions does not mean the destruction of the ideas or initiatives that the posts were meant to oversee. In his eyes, these officers’ duties will be reallocated to other administrators, cutting hefty salaries from University payroll while maintaining Cornell's various commitments.