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From President James Muyskens:
The Book of Ecclesiastes tells us that "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven." I am so fortunate in that I have been able to spend almost twelve seasons at Queens College-longer than any other president in the college's rich history.
There is a time to every purpose under the heaven, but time, of course, waits for no one. When you are president of a college, you have time for almost nothing else but being president of a college. And this is fine, as I have always had a great passion for the mission of our college. However, Alda and I are now grandparents of two boys whom we don't see as much as we would like; and I have long felt a need to get back into the classroom and to do more writing. For these reasons, I will be resigning as president of Queens College as of December 31.
My heart is very full as I write this, because when I think of the many goals that have been achieved in my years at the college, I think of the hundreds of people who were essential in reaching these goals. There is so much we have done together that has been praised by others, such as the Education Trust hailing us as one of the only colleges in the nation that does a first-rate job of educating students from disadvantaged backgrounds; the Washington Monthly citing us for being tops among all public colleges in giving our students "the best bang for the buck"; and the Princeton Review praising the quality of the interactions among our highly diverse student body.
And we have done much more: we have strengthened our admission standards to attract the cream of our city's students; we have hired over 300 fine scholar-teachers who will guarantee the quality of our faculty for years to come; we have raised close to $250 million in two capital campaigns; we have internationalized our curriculum with the expansion of the Education Abroad program and the introduction of the "Year Of" initiative; we have improved our campus with the building of our first residence hall, renovations to Powdermaker Hall, the Kupferberg Center, and Remsen Hall, and countless enhancements to the beauty of our grounds.
I am deeply grateful to former Chancellor Matthew Goldstein and Interim Chancellor Bill Kelly, who both urged me to stay, but were gracious enough to understand my desire to leave at this time. Like me, they are confident that Queens College will be in good hands during this transition period, thanks to the quality of our senior administrative team and the college's interim president, our good friend Evangelos Gizis. A national search will begin immediately, with the expectation that a new president will be on board by the summer.
I must confess that I did not originally plan to stay at Queens College as long as I have, but then, I did not know how much I would come to love and value the people I have had the privilege to work with. I hope that I am leaving Queens College a better place than when I arrived, and am certain that the best days of this college lie ahead.
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