As President Barry Mills enters the final stretch of his 14-year presidency, President-elect Clayton Rose is preparing to take over.
Rose, who has tried to spend at least one day a week on campus since he was announced as Mills’ successor in January, said he has been engaged in a “listening and learning mode” at Bowdoin.
He has not shared his positions on many issues of interest to students on campus this year, including fossil fuel divestment and the state of political dialogue at the College.
“I’m deeply mindful of the fact that President Mills is the president of Bowdoin College, and I don’t want to do anything that gets in the way of his ability to do his job,” he said in an interview with the Orient.
However, he emphasized a desire to be open about these issues once he assumes the presidency.
“At the end of the day, [until] June 30, [President Mills] is the president,” Rose said. “On July 1, then I’m the president, and folks can turn to me and...should expect to have answers to those questions.”
Rose currently serves as a professor of management practice at Harvard Business School, and has continued his teaching full-time this semester.
“It’s been interesting to manage the time commitment,” he said. “I’m fortunate that I live and work in Boston, so it’s manageable for me to be here.”
Rose plans to move to Brunswick in late June, and will live with his family in the house currently occupied by the Mills family.
Rose estimated that he has met with 60 to 70 faculty members in small meetings over coffee. He has gotten to know the senior staff in most departments of the College, and met recently with the Bowdoin Student Government.
“On campus, my work has been to try to begin to meet as many people as possible in all parts of the Bowdoin community, and then...to begin the process of understanding the issues that are facing Bowdoin, and how the work is done here,” he said.
He’s also introduced himself to students in other ways.
“I’ve gone over to Moulton and gotten a tray and...asked people to sit and have lunch, and that’s been awesome,” he said.
Rose said he does not expect the day-to-day running of the College to change very much in the early months of his presidency.
“I’m more mindful of thinking about the medium- to longer-term issues...that we want to think about for the next three to four years, that will have an impact for a long period of time after that,” he said.
One of Rose’s first decisions came on Monday, when he named William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of the Humanities in Gender and Women’s Studies Jennifer Scanlon to the post of interim dean for academic affairs for the next two years.
“I took the counsel of other people, thought about options, but that decision was my decision,” he said.
Scanlon will replace Cristle Collins Judd, who has been at the College since 2006.