President of Harvard paves the way for President of US?
Interesting Stuff
This is the first time in the history that the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States has named a female to be its president!
Drew Gilpin Faust, 59, a scholar of the US South, was named 28th president of the 371-year-old university, making Harvard the fourth of the nation’s eight elite Ivy League schools to name a woman leader. The other three are Amy Gutmann of the University of Pennsylvania, Shirley M. Tilghman of Princeton University, and Ruth J. Simmons of Brown University.
The selection of Faust is a significant move not only to Harvard but also to the nation. Many people might relate it to the upcoming election where Hilary Clinton has a great opportunity to be the first female president of United State of America. Is it paving the way for Hilary Clinton and also a signal to tell Americans: “This is no longer a man’s world; a woman can do better?” Many people said men caused most of the problems in this world. With women as the leader, people hope to see some changes. But is that so? I don’t really think war, power, and aggression have anything much to do with penises than with who wears the pants.
In Faust, Harvard not only has its first woman leader, but a president who has candidly discussed her feminist ideals in a memoir, “Shapers of Southern History: Autobiographical Reflections.” In a speech, Faust mentioned: “I hope that my own appointment can be one symbol of an opening of opportunities that would have been inconceivable even a generation ago,” she also added, “I’m not the woman president of Harvard, I’m the president of Harvard.”
The profile of Drew Gilpin Faust
Age: 59
Home: Cambridge, Mass.
Family: Married Charles Rosenberg, Monrad professor of social sciences at Harvard University; two daughters.
Occupation: Dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University since 2001; Lincoln professor of History.
Experience: Trustee, Bryn Mawr College, the Andrew Mellon Foundation and the National Humanities Center; Civil War and American South historian; Annenberg professor of history and director of the Women’s Studies Program at the University of Pennsylvania; author of five books, including “Mothers of Invention: Women of the Slaveholding South in the American Civil War.”
Education: Bryn Mawr College, bachelor’s degree, 1968; University of Pennsylvania, master’s degree, 1971, and doctorate, 1975.
Other related articles:
– Press release from Harvard
– Press Kit from Harvard
– Remarks by President-Elect Drew G. Faust