Three months after Terence Calloway’s departure, APSU’s campus police department now has a new police chief, Michael Kasitz. An initial pool of 67 candidates was whittled down to three final candidates who then attended day-long on-campus interviews in August. The committee unanimously chose Kasitz as the new police chief who will begin his time at APSU Sept. 9.
In June 2013, Terence Calloway, the former police chief at APSU, vacated his position and moved to Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University (FAMU). After Calloway departed, Mitch Robinson, APSU vice president for Finance and Administration made the position open through Human Resources so that the career opportunity could be widely advertised.
“We submitted the position to HR as soon as Chief Calloway departed,” Robinson said.
“We then established a search committee of five individuals from campus, which included the dean of students, the president of the Faculty Senate, the director of Business Committee Relations and executive assistant to the president, the director of University Facilities and the head cashier in the Business Office. The candidate pool, which consisted of 67 applicants and was reviewed by the Affirmative Action Office, was sent to the committee.”
Robinson said the committee reviewed the list of applicants, and the committee chair recommended that Robinson select applicants for a phone interview. Once the list of phone interviews was decided, it went back through the Affirmative Action office for approval. The phone interviews were conducted and narrowed the list down to three potential candidates, who were then sent back through the Affirmative Action office.
Those three applicants were then invited to the campus for day-long interviews with a series of constituent groups throughout the faculty and staff.
“It was important that the candidates have previous experience in working with police enforcement in higher education,” Robinson said. “There is a significant difference between state and county police enforcement and university enforcement. Officers must be community-oriented, which means visible to the public.”
By unanimous decision of all the groups involved, Kasitz of Eastern Kentucky University was selected as APSU’s new police chief. According to the résumé provided by Robinson, Kasitz’s credentials include 23 years in police work at Eastern Kentucky University and a Master’s Degree in Public Administration.
