It was an historic day on the campus of Hobart and William Smith Friday afternoon as Chair of the Board of Trustees Thomas Bozzuto announced the new president of the Colleges.
“Dr. Joyce Jacobsen has the vision, fortitude, experience and character to lead Hobart and William Smith to a new level of excellence. When she assumes the presidency on July 1st, she will be the first woman in the history of the colleges to hold that role.”
Joyce Jacobsen currently serves as the Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. She is an economist with degrees from Harvard, the London School of Economics, and Stanford University.
In her own remarks Jacobsen said the appointment is particularly meaningful for her as she recalled trips to the library as a child.
“I read through the whole shelf of all the biographies in the children’s section of the library. One that I really read over and over again was one of my heroines growing up, Elizabeth Blackwell. And, the idea that Elizabeth Blackwell went here to Geneva Medical College, the precursor of Hobart and became the first woman physician and that I am basically in some sense following in her footsteps now by becoming the first woman president is very deeply meaningful to me.”
Jacobsen is the 29th President of Hobart College and the 18th of William Smith College.