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AMHERST, Mass., April 5 (AScribe Newswire) -- The Hampshire College Board of Trustees has named Ralph J. Hexter the fifth president of Hampshire College, effective August 1.
Dr. Hexter comes to Hampshire from the University of California at Berkeley, where he is executive dean of letters and science. He holds responsibility for financial administration, human resources, external relations and development for the liberal arts college at Berkeley, with 800 faculty and 500 staff. He serves concurrently as dean of arts and humanities and as professor of classics and comparative literature.
"Hampshire College has a unique place among our nation's colleges and I am honored to join the community as its president," said Hexter. "Nothing is more important at this time than inspiring all generations of Americans to take responsibility for their own education - to expand their horizons and to reflect carefully and critically on the information they access and receive."
Hexter succeeds Gregory S. Prince, Jr., who announced in April 2004 that he would step down on June 30, 2005, after 16 years as Hampshire's president.
In announcing Hexter's appointment, Jerry Nunnally, chair of the Hampshire College Board of Trustees, said, "The board looks forward to working with President-designate Hexter. He is a distinguished scholar and an extremely able administrator. We have tremendous confidence that Hampshire will continue to progress under Dr. Hexter's leadership and that the future of the college remains in the hands of an inspiring president. We are grateful to Trustee Florence Ladd who chaired the search and to those who served on the presidential search committee."
The intense, yearlong presidential search was led by a 15-member committee that included representatives of all major college constituencies - trustees, faculty, students, staff, alumni and parents. Four finalists were invited to Hampshire and met in a series of open forums with the entire campus community.
Florence Ladd, chair, said that the presidential search committee was impressed not only by the finalists but by the caliber of the large pool of applicants. "Many talented and accomplished professionals from a variety of interesting backgrounds sought the Hampshire presidency. To emerge as a finalist in this search said a great deal about a candidate's achievements and attributes. Ralph Hexter's scholarly background, administrative experience and cultural interests made him an ideal candidate for the position of president of Hampshire College."
Hexter holds a Ph.D. and M.Phil. from Yale University, B.A. and M.A. from Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and A.B. from Harvard College. Prior to joining the Berkeley faculty in 1995, he was professor of classics and comparative literature and director of the graduate program in comparative literature at the University of Colorado at Boulder. His first faculty appointment was at Yale University, where he taught for 10 years and was director of undergraduate studies in the humanities major, also serving for one year as acting associate dean of the graduate school.
Hexter is the author of three books on medieval and ancient literature: "Equivocal Oaths and Ordeals in Medieval Literature" (1975); "Ovid and Medieval Schooling: Studies in Medieval School Commentaries on Ovid's Ars Amatoria, Epistulae ex Ponto and Epistulae Heroidum" (1986); and "A Guide to the Odyssey: A Commentary on the English Translation of Robert Fitzgerald" (1993). He is co-editor, with Daniel Selden, of "Innovations of Antiquity" (1992). He has published widely, with articles on Vergil, Horace, Goethe, Verdi and a variety of topics in Medieval Latin in such journals as Modern Language Notes, Helios, Classical Philology, Yale Journal of Criticism and Cambridge Opera Journal.
He has been a visiting lecturer at the Folger Institute in Washington, D.C., and a Fellow of the Villa I Tatti, Harvard Center for Studies in the Italian Renaissance in Florence. A grant from the German government supported his dissertation research on medieval Ovid commentaries in Munich for two years.
Hexter plans to continue work on the classics and their reception in subsequent eras as well as teach undergraduates to the extent his schedule allows. He and his partner of 25 years, Manfred Kollmeier, will bring their cross-country skis out of storage as they return to New England.
Retiring President Gregory S. Prince, Jr., plans to return full-time to Vermont where his wife Toni owns The Prince and the Pauper Riding Academy, "supporting her as she has supported me for the past 16 years," and will pursue a number of projects related to increasing access to college for underserved students.
"Greg's leadership has been both tireless and creative," said board chair Nunnally. "For generations to come, thousands of visitors to Hampshire will experience something of the power of Greg Prince's imagination when they tour the Cultural Village, visiting the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art or the National Yiddish Book Center, which he brought onto the campus. Greg leaves a college that is well prepared to continue to grow and prosper under Ralph's leadership."
President-designate Hexter will lead an undergraduate liberal arts institution that is widely recognized for its innovative academic approach. Rather than follow an imposed structure of course work alone, Hampshire's 1,300 students pursue individualized programs of study, exploring those questions of most concern to them. Working closely with dedicated faculty mentors and across traditional disciplinary boundaries, students undertake increasingly independent work, culminating in an original capstone project completed during the final year. This project, called the Division III, is often published or carried along to graduate school for continuation.
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CONTACT: Elaine Thomas, Hampshire College Communications, 413.559.5482, ethomas@hampshire.edu
NOTE TO EDITORS: Electronic photo available (.JPG) upon request.
ABOUT HAMPSHIRE: Hampshire College maintains a strong social justice commitment and is dedicated to the mission of graduating men and women with the skills and perspectives they need to understand and participate responsibly and creatively in a complex and changing world. The college also is committed to the testing and evaluation of new ideas and innovative methods of teaching and learning, and plays a vital leadership role in higher education in this capacity.
Hampshire is a member of the Five College consortium, which also includes Amherst, Mount Holyoke and Smith Colleges and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
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