Advertisement. Advertise with us

BARBARA JEAN MORRIS OUT

New SUNY Oneonta

President: We Need

To Speak ‘Frankly’

Dennis Craig Aims To Apply

Lessons Learned At Purchase

SUNY Chancellor Jim Malatras convenes this morning press conference in the Morris Conference Center, where he introduced SUNY Purchase acting President Dennis Craig, to his left, as SUNY Oneonta’s interim president, succeeding Barbara Jean Morris.   At left are Oneonta Town Supevisor Bob Wood and City Mayor Gary Herzig; at right, Patrick Brown, chairman of the Oneonta College Council, who will lead the search for Barbara Jean Morris’ successor.  (Jim Kevlin/AllOTSEGO.com)

By JIM KEVLIN & LIBBY CUDMORE • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com

SUNY Oneonta’s interim President Craig says he plans to look forward, not back.

ONEONTA – With the resignation of Dr. Barbara Jean Morris, new SUNY Oneonta interim president Dennis Craig is ready to hear both the good and the bad about how the campus can recover from the COVID-19 outbreak that infected more than 700 students less than week after classes resumed.

“I want to foster an atmosphere where everyone can speak frankly,” he said. “I want to get a back-and-forth dialogue going about what went wrong. People on this campus did a tremendous amount of work, and I appreciate that.”

Craig’s appointment was announced at a 12:30 p.m. press conference called by SUNY Chancellor Jim Malatras.  “SUNY Oneonta is at a critical juncture and Acting President Craig will bring steady, focused, and collaborative leadership to the campus,” said Malatras.

“For the SUNY Oneonta campus, Acting President Craig’s first priority is to ensure students have what they need to complete their fall semester, as well as a clear plan in place for the spring. And Dennis will do so with my support in collaboration and with guidance and feedback from the campus community—particularly our students, with Mayor Gary Herzig and other local officials, and local health officials.”

SUNY Oneonta President Barbara Jean Morris is “pursuing other opportunities.)

According to Malatras, Morris reached out to him 10 days ago to advise him that she was pursuing other opportunities. She became president of the college in 2018, following the retirement of Dr. Nancy Kleniewski.

An hour before the press conference, Malatras met in the Dewar Lounge with collage staff and administrators, as well as Oneonta Mayor Gary Herzig and Town Supervision Bob Wood, to inform them of the change.

“The city is losing a million dollars a semester in water, sewer and bus fees,” said Herzig in comments after the press conference. “A lot of our businesses were hit very hard. But we don’t want to spend time reliving what happened, we want to move forward.”

Craig was acting president at SUNY Purchase when nearby New Rochelle was one of the state’s first COVID-19 “hot spots,” and quickly put into place specific accommodations for students, faculty and staff. “As a result of his actions, SUNY Purchase was one of the best places in the SUNY system,” he said. “They had just a handful of cases.”

The former VP for admissions and associate provost for enrollment at Purchase, Craig served as Interim President for the college’s 2019-20 school year, following the departure of longtime President Thomas J. Schwarz in 2018.

He previously was director of admissions at Montclair State University and the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, the senior director of administration and operations at Pace University’s World Trade Institute and the associate dean of enrollment services at NYU’s College of Dentistry. He was also director of admissions and financial aid at Fairleigh Dickinson University.

He holds a BS in business and economics from SUNY Plattsburgh and an MA in history from Fairleigh Dickinson University. He attended Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education where he earned a certificate from their Institute for Management and Leadership in Higher Education.

“I am truly honored to serve Oneonta during this transition and look forward to working closely with my new colleagues across the college as we continue to rise to the many challenges associated with the pandemic,” said Craig. “Success will require an effective partnership with our students and families, and I am committed to listening to them, as well as working closely with campus and local governance and all stakeholders in the weeks ahead.”

Malatras said the SUNY system is continuing their attack on COVD-19 with a “three-pronged” approach, which includes testing, uniform compliance and transparency.

“We have 64 diverse campuses,” he said. “We’re depending on individual presidents to respond to local situations.”

Posted

2 Comments

  1. I wish the SUNY Oneonta community all the best in these difficult times.

    I suspect that SUNY Oneonta will be better off. Barbara Morris nearly destroyed her previous institution, Fort Lewis College, which had plummeting morale and student enrollments when she was provost.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

Related Articles

SCOLINOS: It’s All We Need To Know: Home Plate 17 Inches Wide

COLUMN VIEW FROM THE GAME It’s All We Need To Know: Home Plate 17 Inches Wide Editor’s Note:  Tim Mead, incoming Baseball Hall of Fame president, cited John Scolinos, baseball coach at his alma mater, Cal Poly Pomona, as a lifelong inspiration, particularly Scolinos’ famous speech “17 Inches.” Chris Sperry, who published sperrybaseballlife.com, heard Scolinos deliver a version in 1996 at the American Baseball Coaches Association in Nashville, and wrote this reminiscence in 1916 in his “Baseball Thoughts” column. By CHRIS SPERRY • from www.sperrybaseballlife.com In 1996, Coach Scolinos was 78 years old and five years retired from a college coaching…

Sports Can Resume, Superintendents Told

CLICK HERE FOR MEMO TO SCHOOLS Sports Can Resume, Superintendents Told COOPERSTOWN – In a memo released Friday evening, county Public Health Director Heidi Bond advised local school superintendents that sports can resume as early as Monday. “Effective Feb. 1, participants in higher-risk sports may participate in individual or distanced group training and organized no/low-contact group training,” Bond wrote, “…including competitions and tournaments, if permitted by local health authorities.”…

Putting the Community Back Into the Newspaper

Now through March 30, new annual subscribers to “The Freeman’s Journal” and AllOtsego.com (or subscribers who have lapsed for two or more years) have an opportunity to help their choice of one of four Otsego County charitable organizations.

$5.00 of your subscription will be donated to the nonprofit of your choice:

Cooperstown Farmers’ Market, Cooperstown Food Pantry, Greater Oneonta Historical Society or Super Heroes Humane Society.