President Bok said yesterday that he is currently conducting extensive interviews with a variety of University personnel in his search for a permanent dean of the Faculty.

Bok said he has conducted between 40 and 50 personal interviews and made about 100 phone calls to solicit suggestions for filling the position vacated in January by John T. Dunlop.

Bok said he hopes to have a permanent replacement for Franklin L. Ford, acting dean of the Faculty, by the end of March, although the process may take somewhat longer.

The interviews are intended to elicit suggestions about the types of qualities the new dean will need as well as particular names, Bok said.

'Thinks for Himself'

The permanent dean will be someone who is willing to exercise a certain degree of independence, Bok said. "I want someone who thinks for himself," he explained.

Bok said his interviews have indicated that particular patterns of suggestions are emerging, centering around about ten names, which he declined to reveal.

He added, however, that the emerging pattern is a "continuum," and not a rigid line. "I have not created a neat, ordered list," he said.

Bok said he will continue his interviewing and engage in "a continuous narrowing down process."

"I'm making a particular effort to get people to talk about candidates who are not especially prominent--who are not in the news all the time," he explained.

Bok said in his interviews he has not detected factionalizing or attempts by Faculty or Administration members to coalesce in favor of particular candidates for the post. "There are no organized groups and no attempts to mass behind particular candidates," he said.

He added he was grateful that no such jockeying for position had occurred, and said he has met with cooperation thus far from the people he has consulted.

Bok said that resurgent activism by the Graduate Student and Teaching Fellow Union has not prompted him to speed up his search. "If anything, I would not want to plummet the new dean immediately in the middle of a controversy without giving him an opportunity to reflect about the problems he will face," he said.

Bok said almost all the candidates mentioned to him are currently connected with the Faculty, although one or two have no present connection.