President Gee resigns, will become chancellor of Vanderbilt University

E. Gordon Gee, 17^th president of Brown University, has resigned as president and accepted an appointment as chancellor of Vanderbilt University. He will leave Brown April 15, 2000, and begin his work at Vanderbilt August 1.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — E. Gordon Gee, the 17^th president of Brown University, has resigned the Brown presidency and accepted an appointment as chancellor of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. His appointment, effective Aug. 1, 2000, was announced at noon EST today (Monday, Feb. 7, 2000) by Vanderbilt officials at news conference in Nashville. Gee will remain at Brown until April 15.

“Members of the Brown Corporation are disappointed that President Gee has chosen to leave. He was an energetic and exciting president and we are sorry his tenure has been brought to an end after two years,” said Stephen Robert, chancellor of the University. “ I am confident that the student body, faculty and administration will work together to keep Brown moving forward. Brown is an institution of great strength and extraordinary academic quality, ranking among the nation’s and the world’s foremost institutions of higher learning.”

Robert will chair the Corporation’s search committee, the membership of which will be announced at the Corporation’s next meeting, Feb. 24-26. Although the Brown Charter of 1764 gives the Corporation sole responsibility for selecting the University’s presidents, the Corporation is assisted in that task by a campus-based advisory committee of faculty, students and administrators. That campus advisory committee will also be constituted later this month.

An interim president will be named by April, Robert said.

During Gee’s presidency, which began in January 1998, Brown has continued to move forward on its institutional priorities:

• Public service – In keeping with his vision of Brown as a private university with a public purpose, Gee chaired the selection committee for the new superintendent of Providence public schools and currently serves as president of the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council.
  
  
• Strategic planning – Gee restructured his administration to assure that academic priorities would drive the University’s strategic planning process. He articulated five broad goals for all areas of the University: 1) revitalizing the undergraduate experience, 2) reinventing graduate education, 3) enhanced support for an excellent medical school, 4) maintaining Brown’s strong commitment to the community, and 5) the integration of academic and economic models.
  
  
• New financial aid policy – In February 1999, Brown announced a new financial aid policy that increased grants and reduced debt for incoming scholarship students and established a minimum $1,000 scholarship for students who would have otherwise received only loans.