U. bids Exec VP a fond farewell

It was a nice good-bye party, complete with good food and lots of balloons. But Marna Whittington -- departing executive vice president and guest of honor -- seemed embarrassed by it all. Arriving at the Faculty Club Friday afternoon for her farewell to the University, she grinned sheepishly at the lavish spread of catered goodies and the hundreds of red and blue balloons laid out for the reception in the club's Alumni Hall. Party organizers spared no detail -- someone had even gone to the trouble of fastening photocopied cut-outs of Whittington's head to some of the balloons. "You know how I feel about the unessential allocation of resources," joked Whittington, who is leaving the University at the end of the month to join a private investment management firm. The couple hundred University employees at the reception laughed at the line. But for those who praised Whittington's performance as the University's top-ranking financial officer since 1988, the cost was worth it. "She's absolutely superb," Emeritus Molecular Biology Professor Robert Davies said. "Many people I know think she's the most important person at the University right now." Within moments of her arrival just after 4 p.m., Whittington became the focus of attention. Dozens of people at the University, from top-level administrators to University Trustees to support staff, offered their best wishes as they paraded by. All over the room, private conversations sang Whittington's praises. As guests sampled hors d'oeuvres, they discussed her mastery of financial matters, her effective leadership style and her crisis management skills. Several University officials joined Police Commissioner John Kuprevich in praising Whittington for her support of campus security. Others talked about her role in stabilizing and strengthening the University's finances. "Marna was a magnet to everyone here," said Vice President for Finance Selimo Rael, who was hired by Whittington last year. Her successor "is going to have a lot of dimensions to fill," he predicted. "The only thing she did wrong was that she was not president," a senior faculty member said half-jokingly. During remarks to the crowd, President Sheldon Hackney said that Whittington "has helped us transform this University in a real way and I want to salute her." Standing beneath a blue and white sign proclaiming, "Thank You MARNA!," Hackney presented Whittington with a chair as a gift from the University. Hackney said the chair was not "just any chair," but "a genuine replica" of the kind made for College Hall in 1872. Whittington, noticeably moved by the reception, thanked her colleagues for their work over the years and told them that leaving the University was a "very difficult decision" for her. But she said her new job with the firm of Miller, Anderson & Sherrerd in West Conshohocken, Pa. will not take her too far from campus. And because the firm was founded by University Trustee Paul Miller, she said she is joining "a different part of the Penn family."

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