James O. Freedman

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James Oliver Freedman (September 21, 1935 - March 21, 2006) was a career academic administrator. A graduate of Harvard College and Yale Law School, he would briefly serve as Dean of the University of Pennsylvania Law School; as the sixteenth president of the University of Iowa from 1982 to 1987; and as the fifteenth president of Dartmouth College, from 1987 to 1998. Freedman self-consciously tried to create at both Iowa and Dartmouth, as The New York Times described it, "a haven for intellectuals," with mixed results.

[edit] University of Iowa Presidency

Freedman's tenure at the University of Iowa was dominated by the failed $25 million laser project he championed throughout his presidency. In his words, "The University of Iowa can grasp the opportunity for national and world leadership in laser science."[1] To achieve this goal, he relentlessly lobbied the Iowa state legislature to assign the enormous funds necessary, arguing that the laser project would become a magnet for research grants from Federal and International agencies. The rationale was that the influx of research monies would alleviate the depressed local economy, provide jobs, and bring in the needed monies to consistently improve the laser project, which would be necessary in order to maintain its viability as a research center.

However, though the $25 million necessary for the laser research center were allocated, the expected research grants failed to materialize; because of its inability to attract research funding, the laser soon fell behind in terms of scientific usefulness. And since it did not attract the grants and funding originally projected, it failed to create the local jobs that had been anticipated. In effect, the costly laser center became a white elephant.

Critics in Iowa would later claim that Freedman lobbied for and used the laser project as a way to raise his profile, and therefore position himself for a more academically prestigious position, such as the Dartmouth Presidency. In fact, he was named to the Dartmouth post just as the laser project began to fall apart.

[edit] Dartmouth Presidency

His administration was marked by numerous academic initiatives, a growth of the physical campus, and a strengthening of Dartmouth's graduate programs and professional schools. However, many of these initiatives—especially the growth of the North Campus and the emphasis on graduate programs at the expense of undergraduate education—were severely criticized by alumni and students, who considered the initiatives the "Harvardization of Dartmouth", and denigrated the measures in toto as "Darvard".

President Freedman established or revitalized programs in Latin American, Latino, and Caribbean Studies; Environmental Studies; Jewish Studies; and Linguistics and Cognitive Science. He introduced or restored the teaching of the Arabic, Hebrew, and Japanese languages, founded the Institute of Arctic Studies, and incorporated into the curriculum majors in Women's Studies and African and African-American Studies.

During his administration, Dartmouth achieved gender parity in the student body. In the professorial ranks the College led the Ivy League with the highest proportion of women among tenured and tenure-track faculty.

Freedman also presided over the largest capital campaign in Dartmouth's history—the so-called "Will to Excel" campaign, which raised $568 million, exceeding the original $425 million goal. Those resources supported Dartmouth's faculty, fortified its financial aid resources, and provided for several important facilities projects. His administration saw the addition of state of the art buildings for the Computer Sciences, Chemistry, and Psychology, as well as The Roth Center for Jewish Life and the Rauner Special Collections Library, part of the North Campus initiatives he championed.

Shortly before he stepped down in 1998, ground was broken for the Baker-Berry Library project, a pioneering model for access to books and electronic information in the 21st century.

The author of an award-winning book Idealism and Liberal Education, Freedman became one of the nation's most eloquent spokespersons on the importance of the liberal arts and, under his leadership, Dartmouth enhanced its reputation as one of the country's most respected institutions of higher learning.

President Freedman died of non-Hodgkins lymphoma on March 21, 2006.

[edit] Criticism

Freedman was unable to cement a strong relationship with the much of the Dartmouth community, who felt that he dismissed their concerns and was uninterested in maintaining Dartmouth as an undergraduate college first, a research and graduate university second.

One of the most serious missteps of Freedman's administration was the mishandling of the "Hitler Quote" scandal of The Dartmouth Review in 1991. A quote from Mein Kampf was surreptitiously inserted into the masthead of the conservative college paper; this vandalism was subsequently traced to a disgruntled former staffer. Its then editor, on discovering the vandalism three days after the paper had been distributed (no one having noticed the vandalism until then), pulled the copies of the weekly and issued an immediate and campus-wide apology. However, Freedman organized a "Rally Against Hate" in reaction to the incident, under the rationale that racism and anti-semitism had no place on Dartmouth's campus, and invited the national press to the event. The rally, however, became a political faux pas, as it was widely seen both on and off campus as an attack on The Dartmouth Review and the undergraduates on its staff.

It is believed that, though he had been short-listed for the job, this incident was the reason Freedman was not offered the Presidency of Harvard upon the retirement of Derek Bok in 1991.

The "Will to Excel" capital campaign was also widely criticized. Begun at his initiative shortly after assuming the job of Dartmouth President, initially the Will to Excel campaign was viewed as a positive step for Dartmouth. However, many of the endowment donations were specifically earmarked for graduate programs, directly counter to the explicit promise Freedman had made that the funds would be earmarked exclusively for the undergraduate departments. Furthermore, many observers felt that, in his desire to accumulate donations, Pres. Freedman was willing to cut any deal in order secure donations. The Baker-Berry Library is an example of the problem: specific funds were earmarked for a library, rather than for the general endowment of the college, yet were accounted for as part of the "Will to Excel" endowment campaign.

Freedman was also severely criticized on campus for his insistence on doing away with Greek fraternity and sorority organizations. The co-ed/fraternity/sorority system at Dartmouth enjoys a 60% affiliation among upper-classmen (first years are ineligible). During his presidency, only five sororities were allowed, under the rationale that no more were needed. However, since all five of the sororities were over-pledged, every year prospective new members were turned away—which thus became, according to the Freedman administration, an example of the "exclusive practices" perpetrated by the sorority system against Dartmouth women.

[edit] External links

• Dartmouth College
• Wheelock Succession: James O. Freedman
• "Freedman, College president emeritus, dies at 70", Kevin Garland and Tara Kyle, The Dartmouth, March 28, 2006.