Joanne V. Creighton

Infobox University President


width = 150px
name =Joanne V. Creighton
caption =
order =17th
university =President of Mount Holyoke College
term_start = 1996
term_end =Present
birth_date =
birth_place =Marinette, Wisconsin
death_date =
death_place =
predecessor =Elizabeth Topham Kennan
successor =
alumnus =University of Wisconsin-Madison
Harvard Graduate School of Education
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
residence =
profession =Professor
religion =
salary =
spouse =
children =
website = [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/index.shtml Office of the President]
footnotes =|

Joanne V. Creighton, Ph.D. is currently serving as the 17th President of Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts. She is also the current chair of the Women's College Coalition.

Background

Creighton was born in Marinette, Wisconsin. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She has a Master of Arts in Teaching from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and a Ph.D. in English literature from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Creighton taught at Wayne State University from 1968-1985 and became dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1985. She then served as the vice president for academic affairs and provost and professor of English from 1990-1994 at Wesleyan University and was Wesleyan's interim president from 1994 to 1995.

Mount Holyoke College

Creighton joined Mount Holyoke College as president in 1996. [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/jvcctt.shtml Mount Holyoke College :: Inaugural Address: Celebrating Traditions and Transformations ] ] She was chosen, in part, due to her history as an advocate for the tradition of American liberal arts colleges [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/comm/csj/950216SE/release1.html New President Press Release ] ] (Creighton has commented that such an education is "at its best, revolutionary. It transforms students; it awakens them to a fuller life of the mind." [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/liberal.shtml Mount Holyoke College :: Liberal Arts Education More Important Than Ever ] ] ) As president, Creighton initiated the "Plans for Mount Holyoke" for 2003 and 2010 which "led to the creation of three new interdisciplinary centers: the Weissman Center for Leadership and the Liberal Arts, the McCulloch Center for Global Initiatives, and the Center for the Environment." [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/cic/about/detailed.shtml#embracing Mount Holyoke College :: A Detailed History ] ] This involvement would later be credited as leading to the further development of Mount Holyoke: "it is a testament to the cohesive sense of purpose articulated in two strategic plans, shared across the institution, and so carefully nurtured by Joanne Creighton's artful leadership." [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/comm/news/newsfull.shtml?node=4794879 Mount Holyoke College :: News ] ]

While at Mount Holyoke, Creighton also became involved with "Women's Education Worldwide," [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/jvcwew.shtml Mount Holyoke College :: Women's Education Worldwide 2004 ] ] an alliance of institutions of higher education whose goal is to advance women's education around the globe. [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/proj/wew/ Women's Education Worldwide ] ] This international initiative was founded in 2003 by Mount Holyoke and Smith Colleges, two of the original Seven Sisters (colleges) of U.S. higher education. [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/proj/wew/about.html Women's Education Worldwide ] ]

Women's colleges

Creighton has written extensively on the subject of women's colleges. She suggests a link in a 21 May 2007 article for "The Boston Globe" between Drew Gilpin Faust's (a woman's college graduate) new role as as Harvard University's first female president and the continuing importance of women's colleges. She also compares women's colleges to Virginia Woolf's, "A Room of One's Own." [cite news |first=Joanne|last=Creighton|url=http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/05/21/why_we_need_womens_colleges?mode=PF|title=Why we need women's colleges| publisher=boston.com | date= 2007-05-21| accessdate=2007-05-21] This article was taken from a longer paper, "A Tradition of Their Own or, If a Woman Can Now Be President of Harvard, Why Do We Still Need Women's Colleges?" delivered at the Harvard Graduate School of Education on April 16, 2007. [ [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/14897.shtml Mount Holyoke College :: A Tradition of Their Own ] ]

cholarship

The author of four books on William Faulkner, Joyce Carol Oates, and Margaret Drabble, Creighton has also written a number of book reviews as well as op-eds and articles on issues facing higher education and women's colleges.

elect works

* "Joyce Carol Oates: Novels of the Middle Years" (1992)
* "Margaret Drabble" (1985)
* "Joyce Carol Oates" (1979)
* "William Faulkner's Craft of Revision: The Snopes Trilogy, the Unvanquished and Go Down Moses" (1977)
* [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/jvcpen.shtml Letters, Speeches, and Articles by Joanne V. Creighton]

ee also

*Presidents of Mount Holyoke College

Notes

External links

* [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/president/jvcbio.shtml Official Website]
* [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/library/arch/col/rg4ui.htm Biography]
* [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/offices/comm/csj/950216SE/release1.html Mount Holyoke College appoints Joanne Creighton President]
* " [http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/wappp/events/spring07/joanne_creighton.htm Educating Women to Become Global Leaders] " - Harvard University