ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, May 19, 1996 TAG: 9605200082
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CHRISTINA NUCKOLS STAFF WRITER
NOTE: Above
AS THE COLLEGE'S NINTH PRESIDENT, she looks forward to being a guiding force into the 21st century.
There was a bounce in her step as Janet Rasmussen advanced toward a group of about 125 people waiting to welcome her as Hollins College's ninth president.
Rasmussen - the vice president for academic affairs at Nebraska Wesleyan University in Lincoln - was introduced to faculty, students and alumnae at a ceremony Saturday. Just hours earlier, the Board of Trustees voted to make her the successor to Margaret O'Brien.
"Women who are going places start at Hollins, and I am starting out to take all of you with me on this fantastic voyage into the 21st century," Rasmussen told the gathering on the campus's main quad.
Rasmussen, 47, said her visit to Hollins earlier this month convinced her that the relationship was "a remarkably good fit."
"I look back on more than two decades of academic work, and I see three strands of ongoing personal engagement: international education, women's issues and creative expression," she said. "All three of these lie at the heart of Hollins' programs."
She expressed enthusiasm for the college's goals to revise the curriculum and form more partnerships with Roanoke and surrounding communities.
Rasmussen was selected from a pool of 150 candidates, which was whittled down to 16 semi-finalists and then three finalists. Elisabeth Muhlenfeld was chosen president of Sweet Briar College in Amherst County last week, narrowing the field to two candidates. The other finalist was Constance Rooke, associate vice president-academic at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada.
Hollins' 13-member presidential selection committee voted Thursday to recommend Rasmussen to the board of trustees. The trustees didn't officially vote on the recommendation until Saturday morning, shortly before the announcement.
Anna Lawson, chairwoman of the selection committee, said Rasmussen rose to the top based on her "strong intellect, her experience as an administrator and her joy in life."
"For me personally, I wanted someone who had a real sense of her integrity and friendliness and also someone I felt people would trust," said Lillian Potter, one of two student representatives on the committee.
Faculty members had similar comments, according to George Ledger, dean of the faculty.
"A remarkable number of them said, 'I know this person. I only met her for 45 minutes, but I know this person.'''
Rasmussen held the No.2 slot at Nebraska Wesleyan, which has an enrollment of 1,400.
"Her reputation on campus, in a word, is excellent," Nebraska Wesleyan President John White Jr. said Friday.
Rasmussen, like the other finalists, has experience in curriculum development. She led the faculty at Nebraska Wesleyan in a project to redesign the university's core academic requirements and was involved with the expansion of international education opportunities there.
Asked about her ideas for restructuring Hollins' curriculum, Rasmussen declined to give specifics other than to say a strong liberal arts foundation would be retained and learning objectives would be made clearer.
White said most of Rasmussen's fund-raising experience has been with institutional grants rather than alumni and other individual donors, but he said that's not an uncommon background for incoming college presidents.
O'Brien, who announced in December that she would leave Hollins to take the helm at St. Mary's College in Maryland, has established a reputation as a strong promoter of the college at the national level and a formidable fund-raiser.
"In my judgment, Maggie O'Brien is without peer as an external president," said Jane Spilman, trustee chairwoman.
She said Rasmussen is likely to establish priorities in strengthening recruitment, admission and retention.
Art Professor Robert Sulkin, a member of the search committee, also said he believes Rasmussen will split her time between internal and external affairs "fairly evenly."
O'Brien, who is suffering from laryngitis, did not speak at the ceremony Saturday, but later said: "I could not be more pleased with the selection of Janet Rasmussen as Hollins' ninth president. ... With such a talented, vivacious and energetic leader as president, Hollins will thrive."
Rasmussen graduated with a degree in English from the University of Illinois in 1970. She studied at the University of Oslo - where she met her husband, Ulf, a Norwegian - before returning to the United States to obtain her master's degree and doctorate in Germanic languages and literature at Harvard.
For the past five years, the couple have juggled two households. Ulf Rasmussen raises salmon for the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife, but he plans to leave that job and scout for fish farming prospects in Virginia.
Rasmussen will not attend today's commencement. She is flying to Seattle to celebrate with her husband. The couple plan to move to Roanoke in late July. Rasmussen will become president of Hollins in August.
LENGTH: Medium: 98 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ERIC BRADY/Staff. Sameea Mahmud, 1, wanders across theby CNBHollins College stage during Janet Rasmussen's speech Saturday.
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