| William R. Cotter | |
|---|---|
| President of Colby College | |
| Term | 1979 – 2000 |
| Predecessor | Robert E. L. Strider |
| Successor | William D Adams |
| Alma mater | Harvard College, Harvard Law School |
William R. Cotter was a lawyer and President of Colby College from 1979–2000, the longest serving president of all time at the college.
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Cotter was the second son of a stay-at-home mother and a director-of-industrial-relations father who worked at a Chevrolet plant, neither of whom had attended college. He graduated from Washington Irving High School in Tarrytown, N.Y. in 1954, magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1958, and cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1961.[1]
Cotter worked as an assistant attorney general in Northern Nigeria, then a law associate with Cahill Gordon & Reindel on Wall Street. Cotter served as one of the first White House Fellows during the Johnson Administration. After finishing the fellowship he became an 's assistant representative at the Ford Foundation in Colombia and Venezuela, which gave scholarships for Colombians and Venezuelans to attend U.S. colleges. He returned to New York in 1970 to coordinate the foundation's educational programs before becoming the president of the African-American Institute.
Cotter was the longest serving president at Colby, throughout his years also teaching in the Government Department. Under his leadership, the College increased its endowment from $25 million to $242 million (1979-2000), constructed or expanded more than 20 buildings, and added more than 30 endowed faculty chairs. He is well remembered for removing fraternities from campus; he is also prominently known for expanded efforts to increase diversity on campus in students and faculty. During his presidency the number of minority students increased from 64 (4 percent) in 1979 to 249 (14 percent) in 2000, and the number of minority tenure-track faculty members increased from four (3 percent) to 23 (16 percent). His time also saw record numbers of students participate in international study programs.[2][3]
President Cotter and his wife Linda are remembered by the William R. Cotter Distinguished Teacher Professorship and the Linda K. Cotter Internship Fund. In 1997 trustees named the student center Cotter Union.