Tenn. administrator approved to lead UMass-Amherst
By Peter Schworm, Globe Staff
The University of Massachusetts Board of Trustees today approved the appointment of Robert C. Holub as chancellor of the state's flagship campus in Amherst.
 (University of Massachusetts) |
Holub, the current provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, is a veteran administrator who was chosen over three other finalists for the Amherst position. The 58-year-old is a distinguished academic who has written extensively about philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. UMass officials hope his credentials will help elevate UMass-Amherst's standing among national research institutions.
Holub, who said he will probably begin at Amherst around Aug. 1, told the Board of Trustees today that he has an abiding belief in public education as a springboard to a better life.
"I'm convinced public higher education provides a pathway of opportunity to prosperity and eminence," especially to students who would not otherwise continue their studies, he said. "It's a very important part of the American dream."
Holub pledged to create a culture of high standards and accountability.
"UMass-Amherst is the best public research university in New England, but that's not enough," he said. "We can make UMass-Amherst the peer of the best public universities in the country."
Holub served for two years as the Knoxville campus' chief academic officer after nearly three decades at the University of California at Berkeley, where in 2003 he was named dean of the College of Letters and Science.
At Berkeley, he oversaw 18,000 undergraduates and introduced reforms in general education, undergraduate advising, and educational policy. Contract negotiations are preliminary, but Holub is expected to make a commitment of three years.
Holub's appointment follows a lengthy national search. He will succeed Thomas W. Cole Jr., who took over after John Lombardi departed last year to become president at Louisiana State University.
Last spring's news that Lombardi would be stepping down as part of a restructuring of university leadership outraged faculty members, who cast a vote of no confidence in President Jack M. Wilson and the Board of Trustees.
A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Holub specializes in 19th- and 20th-century German intellectual, cultural, and literary history. He and his wife, Sabine, have three young children.
