Notebook - September 8, 1999
Trustee Peter Lewis '55 gives $55
million to Princeton
Gift will benefit Institute for Integrative Genomics
Term trustee Peter B. Lewis '55 has made a $55-million gift to the university,
of which $35 million will be used for its pioneering new Institute for Integrative
Genomics. Launched last year, the Institute will build on the university's
strengths in the sciences and engineering to develop an innovative, multidisciplinary
approach to examining how the actions of different genes are integrated
in living organisms. Lewis, who is chairman and CEO of the Progressive Corporation,
one of the nation's largest auto insurers, made the donation to mark the
45th anniversary of the graduation of his class.
A longtime patron of the arts, Lewis chairs the board of trustees of
the Guggenheim Museum in New York. He helped to establish a gallery of contemporary
art at the university's Art Museum and to create the Cleveland Center for
Contemporary Art.
The part of Lewis's gift dedicated to the Institute will be used to support
the work of senior faculty and postdoctoral and senior visiting researchers.
An innovative aspect of the program will allow young scientists, appointed
for five years, to work on research of their own design without the distractions
of teaching and committee work typically shouldered by tenure-track faculty
members. The focus of that research will be on translating the expanding
wealth of information on genetic sequences into discoveries about cells
and their mechanics. "The intent is to bring in people early in their
careers and give them a lot of freedom to try risky things" for which
they would otherwise have a difficult time raising outside funding, said
Shirley M. Tilghman, the director of the new Institute and a professor in
the life sciences.
In addition to his gift to the Institute, Lewis has allocated a significant
share of his gift to the Class of 1955's 45th Annual Giving campaign.
Faculty salaries rise
For the second year in a row, average faculty salaries have increased
at twice the rate of inflation. While inflation rose 1.6 percent in 1998-99,
faculty salaries increased 3.6 percent, according to an annual report released
last April by the American Association of University Professors. The report,
"Ups & Downs," said that 1998-99 was a good year for faculty
salaries, but better for some professors than others.
Princeton was one of 19 universities that paid its full professors more
than $100,000 on average. Only Rockefeller University, Harvard, and Stanford
pay their full professors more.
Full professors at Princeton saw their salaries rise 4 percent. In 1998-99
they made on average $114,900 (up from $110,300 in 1997-98), while associate
professors earned $68,800, assistant professors $54,300, and instructors
$44,300. Those figures compare, respectively, to national averages at schools
that award doctorates of $83,207, $57,924, $48,531, and $34,934.
In recent years, the university has made an effort to make the salaries
of assistant professors more competitive, Provost Jeremiah P. Ostriker said.
Compared with the salaries of full professors at other doctoral-level
institutions, Princeton's full professors are in the top 5 percent and its
associate and assistant professors are in the top 20 percent, said Ernst
Benjamin, AAUP's director of research. Princeton's salaries are particularly
competitive because it has no law or business schools, which typically push
up average salaries, Benjamin added.
The report determined there are several disturbing trends among faculty
salaries nationwide: in general, faculty members earn significantly less
than comparably educated professionals; salary disparities persist between
male and female faculty; and there is a gap between what faculty earn at
public and private independent (not religious) institutions.
At Princeton, the gap between salaries of men and women is "unusually
close for a private research university," Benjamin said. The average
salary for a male full professor is $115,400, and for a female is $111,800.
At Harvard those figures are $123,800 and $112,900, respectively, said Benjamin.
The AAUP's report was based on a survey of more than 1,861 institutions-1,017
public, 401 private, and 443 church-affiliated campuses.
-Kathryn Federici Greenwood
Six join Board of Trustees
This month six alumni will join the Board of Trustees. They are charter
trustee Brent L. Henry '69, term trustees Heidi Miller '74 and Crystal L.
Nix '85, alumni trustees A. Scott Berg '71 and Andrea Jung '79, and young
alumni trustee Brian C. Johnson '99. Charter trustees serve for 10 years,
term and alumni trustees for four. Charter and term trustees are nominated
through a committee of the Board of Trustees and elected by the whole board.
Alumni trustees are nominated and elected by the alumni. Young alumni trustees
are elected by the junior and senior classes and the two most recent graduating
classes.
Brent L. Henry '69 is vice-president and general counsel of the
MedStar Healthcare Group, a large healthcare delivery system in the Washington,
D.C., area. Henry is the former chairman of the Alumni Council and is a
director of the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law. He earned a master's
degree in urban studies and a law degree from Yale.
Andrea Jung '79 is president and chief operating officer of Avon
Products. She sits on the boards of General Electric, Zale Corporation,
the Fashion Institute of Technology, and the Fragrance Foundation. She also
has led fundraising efforts for Girls Incorporated and Girl Scouts of America.
Crystal L. Nix '85 is a special counsel in the litigation department
of O'Melveny & Myers LLP in Washington, D.C. She graduated from Harvard
Law School in 1990. Nix is an advisory council member of the Woodrow Wilson
School and a former board member of paw. She is a member of the Council
on Foreign Relations and on the executive committee of the International
Human Rights Law Group.
Heidi Miller '74 is the chief financial officer of Citigroup,
one of the world's largest financial services companies. She earned a Ph.D.
in history from Yale in 1979. She is a member of the Advisory Council for
the Bendheim Center for Finance at Princeton and is also on the board of
the Children's Defense Fund.
A. Scott Berg '71 has published three acclaimed books. His first,
Max Perkins: Editor of Genius, grew out of his thesis at Princeton and won
the National Book Award. He followed that with Goldwyn: A Biography, about
Samuel Goldwyn, and the Pulitzer Prizewinning Lindbergh. He has given
two lecture series at university events, "Princeton in the Nation's
Cinema" and "Mr. Stewart Goes to Hollywood," and is a member
of the Advisory Committee of the English department.
Brian C. Johnson '99 is preparing to become an elementary school
teacher in Louisiana through the Teach for America program. In his sophomore
year, he was elected to the Undergraduate Student Government, serving as
vice-president and a member of the budget-setting Priorities Committee.
Ask The Expert
Wolfgang F. Danspeckgruber, Director of the Liechtenstein Research
Program in Self-Determination
What are the next steps in bringing stability to Kosovo, Serbia,
and the Balkans?
The suffering in Kosovo and Serbia-by men, women, and children alike-has
been indescribable. Close to 10,000 Kosovo Albanians have lost their lives,
thousands have been injured, and some 900,000 have become deportees. Ninety
percent of them are now on their way back to Kosovo-but mostly to devastated
or nonexistent homes. The long-term impact on the youth and the society
is dramatic. NATO bombing has apparently also caused more than 1,000 civilian
and military Yugoslav casualties and significantly damaged infrastructure,
industry, communication, and power supplies. Reconstruction of the region
will demand billions of dollars of assistance, and, most importantly, it
will require the determination of both the Serbs and the Albanians as well
as the international community.
What is the solution? First, President Slobodan Milosevic and his regime
must give up power. Second, Kosovo, the rest of Yugoslavia, and the entire
Balkan region have to be reintegrated into Europe. Borders of Kosovo and
Yugoslavia ought not to be redrawn, which would only create "winners"
and "losers." Instead, borders should be reduced to holding merely
symbolic value by regional integration and Europeanization. A concrete action
plan (such as the European Unioninitiated Stability Pact) will encourage
cooperation among the South Balkan states of Albania, Greece, Macedonia,
Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia-including Kosovo. The implemented plan should include
a customs union as a step to an eventual single-currency zone as well as
a guarantee on the freedom of movement of people, goods, services, and capital.
Only by integrating the region into the larger Europe can we revitalize
commerce, interdependence, prosperity, and, most importantly, peace in the
Balkan region.
Critical to rebuilding Kosovo and the rest of Yugoslavia is the demilitarization
of all parties, that is, the confiscation of firearms from civilians, police,
paramilitary troops, and soldiers. Only NATO troops should remain armed.
Organized crime, which is rampant, needs to be combatted. And democracy
has to be introduced. Special attention must be paid to the young who have
been traumatized by the Kosovo crisis. They need to be reeducated in order
to combat revanchism and future violent revenge. If special programs aren't
developed to help the young overcome their experiences, the crisis will
be perpetuated.
In Brief
Wright Hall
C. Bagley Wright, Jr. '46, president of Bagley Wright Investments of
Seattle, has made a $4 million gift to the university to renovate and rename
the north section of Patton Hall. The renovation involves dividing the original
structure, built in 1906, into two separate dormitories, with the south
dormitory retaining the name Patton Hall and the north dormitory being renamed
Bagley Wright '46 Hall. The reconstruction includes a new archway that cuts
through the north section, creating a new east-west pathway through campus.
Patton and Wright halls opened for students this month. A patron of the
arts, Wright was a developer of Seattle's landmark Space Needle.
Secrets Unveiled
Princeton archivists unveiled the secrets of the past in June, when the
John Foster Dulles ['08] State Department Microfilm Collection opened to
the public. At a reception at the Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Deputy
Assistant Secretary of State for Records and Management Frank M. Machak
delivered a letter from Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to President
Shapiro that declassified virtually all of the material in the collection.
Machak noted that Dulles, who served as secretary of state under President
Dwight Eisenhower from 1953 to 1959, had wanted the historical record of
his service to be accessible to historians. Scholars who have used these
records while still classified have described them as "an extraordinary
source for students of U.S. foreign policy." . . . . .The records of
the Council on Foreign Relations, the most influential American foreign-policy
organization in the 20th century, have been deposited for research at the
Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library. The Council's records fill nearly 400
feet of shelving and include the minutes of the off-the-record meetings
and study groups sponsored by the Council over the years.
Annual Giving
This year's AG effort brought in $32,675,084 for the university's coffers
and set a record for the fourth year in a row. The participation rate of
61 percent was the highest level in 30 years. Eight classes-1917, 1922,
1935, 1939, 1942, 1944, 1948, and 1951-had rates better than 80 percent.
Leading the pack in total dollars was the 25th reunion Class of 1974, which
raised $5,019,740, the highest amount ever by any Princeton class, followed
by 1949 ($2,750,000) and 1954 ($2,000,000). For more on AG results, see
the AG Webpage at www.princeton.edu/~ag/agtotals.html.
In Memoriam
Lawrence Stone, social historian
Lawrence Stone, a renowned social historian of early-modern England and
founding director of the Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Historical Studies
at Princeton, died June 16 at his home in Princeton. He was 79 and had been
suffering from Parkinson's disease.
Stone said his research interests spanned "the turbulent centuries
that carried England from the War of the Roses through the Tudor regime
to the Cromwellian Revolution and beyond into the 18th century." His
classes at Princeton included an undergraduate course on England from 1470
to 1690 and graduate seminars on the coming of the English Revolution and
on England from 1660 to 1770.
Born in England, Stone earned his B.A. and M.A. degrees from Oxford in
1946 and remained there until 1962. He joined the Princeton faculty in 1963
as Dodge Professor of History and gained emeritus status in 1990. He served
as department chair from 1967 to 1970, and in 1968 was named director of
the new Davis Center, which was established to provide a focal point for
historical research, to encourage innovation in teaching, and to stimulate
intellectual exchange.
Professor of European History Robert C. Darnton said Stone "set
the pace in what emerged in the 1960s as the new social history, and he
remained our preeminent historian until the day of his death."
Two promoted to tenure
At its May meeting, the Board of Trustees promoted Vincanne Adams of
the anthropology department and Shaun E. Marmon *90 of the religion department
to tenured associate professor.
Adams, a medical anthropologist, specializes in ethnomedicine, the study
of non-Western medical systems, and the social politics of health and healing.
She teaches courses on medical anthropology, and transnational culture and
power. Adams earned her Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley,
in 1989. She came to Princeton in 1992.
Marmon's field is Islamic history and religion with a focus on the culture
of the Mamluk Empire. Her teaching interests include Islamic religion and
culture, holy war and martyrdom, and gender and sexuality within the Islamic
tradition. Marmon earned her Ph.D. from Princeton in 1990 and joined the
faculty in 1992. Her The Quality of Mercy: Intercession and Personal Honor
in an Islamic Society will be published next year by Oxford University Press.
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