Drew Faust in the FT
In the Financial Times, Rebecca Knight has a piece about the challenges lying ahead for Drew Faust.
Some interesting quotes:
Thomas Cech gives his first interview about Harvard (that I know of) since the presidential search:
He says Harvard has not paid sufficient attention to undergraduate education. "Just like deferred maintenance on your buildings, you can live with it for a long time," he says. "When you are really that great, and have a great reputation, you don't pay much of a price for certain things – like undergraduate education – going downhill."
Former Princeton president William Bowen praises Faust:
"Her challenge will be to get people to work together, to think – and act – across traditional disciplinary lines," says Mr Bowen, a senior research associate at the Andrew Mellon Foundation, where Ms Faust is a trustee. "The power of persuasion is very important. She will need to encourage [the faculty], and to inspire. She will be good at that. She has a good sense of interpersonal relations."
Mr. Bowen, as I reported in 02138, did not support the choice of Drew Faust as president.
Also, some blogger pops off.
"Harvard needs to start a capital campaign because: one, it's overdue, and two, Allston is expensive," says Richard Bradley, author of Harvard Rules: The Struggle for the Soul of the World's Most Powerful University. Mr Bradley says that because Ms Faust is "not a celebrity academic, not a larger-than-life personality, or Harvard alumna", her appeal to donors is uncertain."
That's true, I did say that. Please note that I did not say she will not be good at it; my quote is purely a "remains to be seen" kind of thing.
