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Morehouse President Announces His Retirement
MEDIA ALERT
END OF AN ERA
Morehouse President Announces His Retirement
ATLANTA- September 14, 2006—After two years of contemplation and conferring with the Board of Trustees, Dr. Walter E. Massey, president of Morehouse College, will announce this morning that he will retire at the end of the 2006-2007 academic year. The announcement will be made during the annual Opening Convocation at the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel at 10:45 a.m. on the Morehouse College Campus.
Massey, a 1958 graduate of Morehouse, ends his tenure just shy of his 50th class reunion with the college. As the ninth president of the institution, Massey leaves many legacies for the school to celebrate. He has been president of Morehouse for the past 11 years.
Among his accomplishments is the successful completion of the largest capital campaign in the college’s history. The $105 million goal for The Campaign for A New Century was surpassed by $15 million. The total amount raised was an astounding $120 million. Under Massey’s tenure, the school also erected a 74,000-square-foot Leadership Center facility, which now anchors the College’s southern border.
Prior to Morehouse, Massey held a range of administrative and academic positions, including provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at the University of California. In this position, the second most senior position in the UC system, he was responsible for the development of academic and research planning and policy, budget planning and allocations, and programmatic oversight of the three national laboratories the university manages for the U.S. Department of Energy.
Massey is also former director of the National Science Foundation, a position to which he was appointed by former President George Bush. The Foundation is the government’s lead agency for support of research and education in mathematics, science, and engineering. Massey also has served as vice president for research at the University of Chicago and director of the Argonne National Laboratory, dean of the college and professor of physics at Brown University, and assistant professor of physics at the University of Illinois.
Active with a range of organizations, Massey is a member and past chair of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board and is currently serving his second term as a member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, having also served on PCAST under the first President Bush. The recipient of 30 honorary degrees from institutions such as The Ohio State University, Northwestern University, Yale University, and Amherst College, Massey’s leadership in education includes his service as a member of the Gates Millennium Scholars Advisory Council and the National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century, and chairman of the Atlanta Committee for Public Education. In addition, Massey is active on several corporate and foundation boards, including the Mellon Foundation, Motorola Inc., Bank of America Corporation, McDonald’s Corporation, and BP p.l.c.
Born in Hattiesburg, Miss., he and his wife, Shirley Anne, have two sons, Keith and Eric.
**Those interested in interviews with Dr. Walter E. Massey may have access to him at 12:00 p.m. in the library of the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel on Thursday, September 14, 2006.
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