President’s Posts

VCU welcomes new academic leaders

I am very proud that, as we continue to implement our Quest for Distinction strategic plan, Virginia Commonwealth University is one major university with one clear vision.

More and more, we are seeing our focus on high standards drive us to transform the human experience as we know it. We recognize that our future is about our people, including talented and diverse faculty, staff, students and alumni who are committed to leading in their fields. I am grateful that our greatest successes are fueled by each of you. Thank you.

We have accomplished much together as a university, and now welcome several new leaders who, in the academic year that begins in a few weeks, will help raise the bar even higher.

Earlier this month, Bill Ginther began his term as rector of the Board of Visitors. Bill, a retired bank executive, has been on the board since 2010 and served as vice rector last year. Bill also sits on the VCU Health System Authority board of directors and previously served on both the boards of the VCU School of Business Alumni Society and VCU Alumni, serving as president of the latter group in 2003. He is a founding trustee of the School of Business Foundation and is a 2000 recipient of a VCU Alumni Star award. He and his wife, Marsha, support the Ginther Family Merit Scholarship in the School of Business and many other initiatives across the university. Bill earned a bachelor’s degree in business management in 1969 and his master’s degree in 1974, both from VCU.

I look forward to his counsel and leadership of the board and appreciate his generosity and service to his alma mater.

Bill Royall has also just begun his term as vice rector of the board. Bill, who has been on the board since 2011, is chairman of Royall & Company, a firm focused on student recruiting and advancement services. He and his wife, Pam, have long been tremendous supporters of VCU, especially our Institute for Contemporary Art.

Bill Ginther and Bill Royall will be joined by four new members of the board, whose four-year terms begin immediately.

• Nancy C. Everett, from Richmond, Va., is BlackRock managing director and head of U.S. Fiduciary Management Solutions. Nancy, a VCU accounting graduate, is a founding member of the VCU School of Business Foundation.
• Hon. John W. Snow, from Richmond, Va., is chairman of Cerberus Capital Management. John served as the 73rd U.S. Secretary of the Treasury under President George W. Bush. He also was chairman and CEO of CSX Corporation.
• George Richard “Rick” Wagoner, from Birmingham, Mich., is a former chairman and CEO of General Motors. Rick formerly served as chair of the Duke University Board of Trustees and is a member of several international business advisory boards.
• Steve Worley, from Harahan, La., is president and CEO of Louisiana Children’s Medical Center, which includes Children’s Hospital, New Orleans. Steve graduated from VCU with a B.S. in business management and a master’s in business administration.

 
These exceptional individuals are excellent additions to an already outstanding governing board. I look forward to working with them to advance VCU as a nationally competitive research university.

I also deeply appreciate the service of those board members whose terms expired at the end of June: Rector John C. Doswell II, D.D.S.; Lillian L. Lambert; W. Baxter Perkinson Jr., D.D.S.; and Stuart C. Siegel.

The leadership of the Board of Visitors will help us move more solidly into the top 50 among the nation’s public research universities, along with the Board of Directors who govern the VCU Health System, a separate authority that includes representation from the university’s leadership. Five of the 21 VCU Health System board members also serve on the Board of Visitors.

Several other colleagues have new roles:

• Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Claudia Emerson, will join VCU as a faculty member in the Department of English in the College of Humanities and Sciences, beginning Aug. 15. Claudia will teach creative writing workshops and courses in literature and poetics. She was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in poetry in 2006 for her third collection of poetry, “Late Wife,” a series of poems examining one woman’s emotional and personal overlap of past and present. In 2008, she was selected by then-Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine as Poet Laureate of Virginia.
• Bill Decatur, J.D., was nominated vice president for Finance and Administration and will begin Sept. 16. He brings nearly 30 years of experience to VCU, most recently as executive vice president for finance and administration at Rhode Island School of Art and Design. I am excited about working with Bill and am grateful for Pam Currey’s leadership as acting vice president during the transition period.
• Anne Chandler, Ph.D., is interim dean of the VCU Honors College, following Tim Hulsey’s departure last month. Anne, who will serve in this role as a national search is conducted, has been associate dean in The Honors College for seven years and serves as a faculty member in the VCU Department of Rehabilitation Counseling in the School of Allied Health Professions. Please join me in welcoming Anne to her new position.
• Hong Cheng, Ph.D., was named director of the VCU School of Mass Communications in the College of Humanities and Sciences. Hong comes from Ohio University, where he was a tenured professor in the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. His research interests center on international communication, cross-cultural advertising and social marketing, and his works have been presented at national and international conferences since the early 1990s. I am pleased to welcome Hong to VCU.

 

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Tagged July 2013