Cornell University President Hunter Rawlings shocked his campus on Friday when he unexpectedly announced his intent to step down from his post in July of 2003.
Rawlings accepted his current position at Cornell in 1995 and said that he will continue working at the university as a professor in the Department of Classics.
"I have been for a long time a professor at heart," Rawlings said Friday during a press conference held at the Ithaca, NY campus. "That's who I am and that's what I'd like to do again."
Rawlings will have served as Cornell's tenth president for eight years when he retires.
Rawlings announced his intent to step aside as president during the Cornell's March board of trustees meeting.
"We are announcing his intended retirement now so we can begin an orderly process of finding his successor," Cornell Board of Trustees Chairman Harold Tanner said at the press conference. "This timing is very consistent with the procedure we followed in choosing Hunter as president."
Tanner and Chairman-elect Peter Meining will soon appoint a trustee committee to begin the search for Rawling's successor. The committee will be headed by Vice Chairman Edwin Morgens.
"Our intention is to reach out to all of the Cornell constituencies," Meining said at the conference. "We will have student representation, faculty representation and employee representation on the committee."
Cornell spokesman Henrik Dullea said that there are many attributes that contribute to the selection of a new president.
Among them are the candidate's abilities to deal with public policy makers and successfully work with "alumni and friends of the university" to keep a substantial amount of cash flowing into the organization.
"Their focus is to secure the most excellent person possible for the slot, a person who has a very real understanding of the university community," Dullea said.
Meining said that they will pursue prospects both on and off the Cornell campus.
"We look to spread as broad of a net as possible as far as looking for possible candidates for the job," he said.
Though it is still unclear when the next president will be chosen, Meining said that based off the 1994 search following the departure of Frank Rhodes, Rawlings' predecessor, a new president should be picked by December.
Rawlings accomplished much during his seven-year tenure as president.
Among his many achievements, Rawlings heightened Cornell's emphasis on undergraduate education by creating the position of vice provost for undergraduate education and the Presidential Research Scholars program.
Dullea, who described Rawling's tenure as "very active," said that the president derived much satisfaction from his participation in improving Cornell's undergraduate experience as well as increasing its competitiveness.
During Rawling's time in office, Cornell saw a growth in undergraduate applicants and decline in the acceptance rate.
"The next 15 months we're going to pursue [university improvement] as vigorously as we have the last seven years," Rawlings said.
Rawlings graduated with honors in Classics at nearby Haverford College in 1966 and then received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1970.
He also served as the president of the University of Iowa for the seven years before becoming Cornell's president.
Rawlings serves as the current chairman of the Ivy Council of Presidents.
