Johnnetta B. Cole

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Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole (born October 19, 1936) is an American academic who served as the first African American female president of Spelman College. She is the immediate past president of Bennett College, succeeded by American economist, author, commentator, and businesswoman, Dr. Julianne Malveaux.

Cole enrolled in Fisk University at age 15, but transferred to Oberlin College, where she completed a B.A. in sociology in 1957. She attended graduate school at Northwestern University, earning her masters (1959) and Ph.D. (1967) in anthropology. Cole received a LL.D. from Bates College in 1989.

Cole taught briefly at the University of California, Los Angeles (1964) and directed the black studies program at Washington State University at Pullman (1969-70) before teaching in the department of anthropology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst (1970-83), where she also served as provost of undergraduate education from 1981 to 1983. While at UMass, she played a pivatol role in the development of the university's African-American studies program. In 1983, she joined the faculty of Hunter College, where she directed the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program.

Cole became the president of Spelman College in 1987, where she dedicated herself to making the school a center for scholarship about African-American women and became a strong advocate of the liberal arts curriculum. She retired from the presidency in 1997.

As of 2006, Cole is the immediate past chair of the Board of Trustees of United Way of America and serves on the board of directors of the United Way of Greater Greensboro.

Cole is the granddaughter of Florida's first black millionaire Abraham Lincoln Lewis.

[edit] Quotes

"I pose that question to myself, why, in the 107 years of the history of this historically Black college for women, there has not been an African-American woman president."
"This is a nation whose spoken and written vision is chillingly beautiful."

She is a honorary member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc.