Thomas PSU presidency finalist
By MARC HARKNESS
Collegian Staff Writer
The Trustee Presidential Selection
Committee announced yesterday that
Joab L. Thomas, former president of
the University of Alabama, is the
finalist for the Penn State presidency.
The University Board of Trustees will
vote on Thomas' candidacy Monday,
said J. Lloyd Huck, board president and
chairman of the selection committee.
If approved by the board, Thomas will
replace University President Bryce Jor
dan, who is scheduled to retire Aug. 31.
"We believe that Dr. Thomas has the
experience and the ability to build on
the fine record President Jordan and his
administrative team have compiled,"
Huck said at a news conference.
Thomas was not present at the con
ference, but said he would accept the
position in a prepared statement.
"I'm honored to have been recom
mended by the Trustee Selection Com
mittee," Thomas said. "Penn State is
a great university and it would be a
privilege to work with that institution."
As president of Alabama from 1981-
1988, Thomas was successful at bringing
about rapid, positive change, said Rob
ert Barfield, dean of Alabama's College
of Engineering.
"Morale was at probably the lowest
point in the history of the university,"
he said. "He came to the university and
performed a miracle. He improved
markedly not only the morale, but was
able to persuade people from all walks
Weather
Hazy, hot and humid today, high 90.
Warm and muggy tonight, low 66. Hot
and humid again tomorrow with the
chance of an afternoon thunderstorm,
high 88.
Thomas highly
committed to
minority
By MARK E. JONES
and STACY NIEDECKER
Collegian Staff Writers
Joab L. Thomas, the finalist for Penn
State's presidency, was committed to
the concerns of underrepresented
groups while president at the University
of Alabama, said J. Lloyd Huck, chair
man of the Trustee Presidential Selec
tion Committee.
The selection committee reviewed
Thomas' record on cultural diversity
issues and received many strong rec
ommendations, including one from Tus
caloosa's National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People, Huck
said.
"I don't know whether or not Joab's
resume shows this, but one of the rea
sons I knew (him) in earlier days was
his active role in dealing with the civil
rights unrest throughout the South and
the active role he took as dean of stu
dents then," said Robert Barfield, dean
of Alabama's College of Engineering.
Thomas
for accessibility
to student body
By MARK E. JONES
and STACY NIEDECKER
Collegian Staff Writers
If Joab L. Thomas is named Penn
State's president, his hands-on manage
ment style might give students more
access to Old Main.
"He has been known to get his coffee
in the student union building," said
J.P. Muir, president of Penn State's
Undergraduate Student Government.
"He's been known to stop and talk to a
student on the street and drop them a
note two days later to say how nice it
was to talk."
Thomas, president of the University
of Alabama from 1981 to 1988, has a rep
utation for meeting openly with student
groups there.
"I can't say enough nice things about
him as far as that goes, as far as dealing
with students and appreciating stu
dents," said John Coleman, president
of Alabama's student government. "As
university president he's there to deal
for students and I don't think he ever
lost sight of that.
"When you see the university presi
dent come in and tell you how much
you, as a student, mean to the university
. it really means a lot. And it makes
you want to work harder and it makes
you really appreciate what you're doing
and appreciate your institution a lot
more," he added.
Joab L. Thomas
of life to give the university a new level
of support."
Thomas, who would be the 15th pres
ident of the University, would begin his
tenure Sept. 1, Huck said. Jordan pre
viously agreed to stay as president if a
successor could not be found by that
date.
The committee selected Thomas
from a pool of about 12 candidates sub
mitted by the Presidential Search and
Screen Committee, consisting of staff,
faculty and students. The pool contained
Mike Hopkins
rAst: ° '' '' 'WEl P C 74
issues
Thomas, president at Alabama from
1981 to 1988, was dean of student affairs
there from 1969 to 1974.
"More specifically, what Joab did as
president here was make available a
great deal of scholarship money and a
lot of programs to support minority stu
dents," Barfield said. "Joab should be
able to help in that area because he has
a lot of experience."
Cordell Wynn, president of Stillman
College and an Alabama trustee, told
The Associated Press: "As a president
of a historically black college and as an
African American myself, I can say this
man has no fears when it comes to deal
ing across the board with all social,
racial and economic groups. He was one
who really worked well with diversity."
But during Thomas' tenure, the per
centage and number of black students
who attended Thomas' Tuscaloosa cam
pus fell, according to figures from the
University of Alabama.
Black students made up 10.1 percent
Please see DIVERSITY, Page 5.
known
"He's been known to
stop and talk to a
student . . . and drop
them a note two days
Penn State Undergraduate
Student Government president
During the last few years, Penn State
President Bryce Jordan has had little
such contact with students and has been
drawn more to Harrisburg to secure
state appropriations. But a new presi
dent must go out and meet people, Muir
said.
Jordan rarely walked around campus
to speak with students, Graduate Stu
dent Association President Ken Martin
said.
"Jordan, he's pretty much hard to
talk to," said Nicole Batts, president of
Black Caucus. "Maybe it's his style not
to be real visible."
For instance, when black students
held a sit-in in the Telecommunications
Building in 1988, Jordan sent adminis
trators to negotiate.
"But the students wanted to talk to
Jordan, - she said.
one woman and no minorities, Huck
said.
The selection committee requested a
second list of candidates in June when
leading candidates on the first list were
unable to commit to the University.
Huck said one or two of the candidates
on the first list were still considered.
Thomas' candidacy was announced
to the full board last Friday during a
closed-door session of the Penn State
Board of Trustees meeting, Huck said.
As president of Alabama, Thomas led
the
daily
Soviets, Hungarians to establish NATO ties
- J.P. Muir
By SALLY JACOBSEN
Associated Press Writer
BRUSSELS, Belgium In a sharp break with the
past, the Soviet Union and Hungary have accepted
NATO's offer to establish diplomatic ties with the
Western military alliance, officials said yesterday.
The decisions the first by Warsaw Pact nations
came less than two weeks after President Bush and
other NATO leaders extended "the hand of friendship"
to their former adversaries in Eastern Europe.
Hungarian Prime Minister Jozsef Antall announced
his government's plans after paying a visit to the head
quarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization,
the first by a leader of a Warsaw Pact nation.
"With this, the official resumption of contacts has
taken place," he told reporters.
Bryce Jordan
Collegian
Love at first sight
Pepe nibbles on her owner Robert Sahakian of State College at Plants by Suzanne, 105 E.Beaver Ave. Sahakian bought
Pepe, who can whistle "Happy Birthday' and say a few words, in Florida and taught her all she knows. Sahakian and
Pepe enojoyed the outdoors yesterday.
Later, NATO Secretary-General Manfred Woerner,
just back from a trip to Moscow, said the Soviet Union
also intended to set up diplomatic exchanges.
"The Soviet Union and Hungary are the first two
countries with which we are establishing a form of dip
lomatic contact," said NATO spokesman Robin Staff
ord.
the university's first major fund raising
campaign similar to the recently
completed Campaign for Penn State ini
tiated by Jordan.
Jordan said he and Thomas share
other similar goals for the future of
Penn State and higher education in gen
eral.
"I've known Dr. Thomas for a long
time, and I'm delighted to see him
receive this appointment," Jordan said.
"I believe that if we could measure our
philosophies of where Penn State ought
to go, they would line up about the
same.-
In a move resembling Jordan's five
year strategic planning process, Thom
as guided Alabama according to a five
year master plan compiled by commit
tee. Thomas' philosophy made a differ
ence at Alabama, Barfield said.
"Any data you want to look at I'm
serious, any data whether we're talk
ing about number of scholarly papers
published by faculty or number of stu
dents, or number of students receiving
honors, or number of national merit stu
dents or research dollars or anything
else of that sort, the upturn began coin
cidentally with his first year as presi
dent," he said.
The candidate, a native of Russelville,
Ala., received bachelor's, master's and
doctorate degrees from Harvard Uni
versity.
Thomas started at Alabama as an
assistant professor of biology in 1961. In
1964 he became assistant dean of the
College of Arts and Sciences, and in 1969
'"At
MEE
NATO had not yet created a system for accrediting
diplomats to the alliance, he said. No nations outside
the 16 members have official status.
Antall, who met for nearly an hour with Woerner,
said he had asked that Hungary's ambassador to Bel
gium also be accredited in the future to NATO.
"We agreed that if the Soviet Union and Hungary
wish to make any contact . . . this is the way to do it
through the ambassador who is accredited to Bel
gium at the moment," Stafford said.
Earlier this month, Bush and the other NATO lead
ers wound up a critical summit in London by pledging
to reduce their conventional and nuclear.defenses in
Europe and reassuring the East of their peaceful
intentions.
They also invited Soviet President Mikhail S. Gor
bachev to address a NATO meeting and suggested
Moscow and other governments in Eastern Europe
establish "regular diplomatic liaison with NATO."
"This will make it possible for us to share with them
our thinking and deliberations in this historic period
of change," the leaders said in their final statement.
Woerner, who talked to Gorbachev on Saturday in
Moscow, said Gorbachev did not give a date for his
was appointed dean for student devel
opment.
He left Alabama in 1976 to serve as
chancellor of North Carolina State Uni
versity, a position he held until he was
named president of Alabama in 1981.
He stepped down from the Alabama
presidency in 1988 to teach biology after
a controversy over his appointment of
Bill Curry as head football coach.
Thomas said at the time his resignation
was not related to the criticism he
received.
want to see if I still have the intel
lectual horsepower to teach, - he told the
The Atlanta Constitution after he
announced his resignation.
A dispute with Chancellor Thomas
Bartlett over how Alabama's Tuscaloo
sa campus should be run was the final
straw for Thomas, Harry Knopke,
Thomas' former assistant, told The
Associated Press. Bartlett saw the Tus
caloosa campus as part of a trinity in
the Alabama system, along with cam
puses at Birmingham and Huntsville.
Thomas saw Tuscaloosa as the primary
institution, with the other campuses as
branches.
Jordan said Thomas will have to gain
an understanding of Penn State's Com
monwealth campuses to be an effective
president.
Thomas will spend the remainder of
July and August becoming acquainted
with Penn State's campus, administra
tion and with the state legislature, Huck
said. One month should be sufficient
time for transition, he said.
"He will be traveling back and forth
within the next 30 days," Jordan said.
When Jordan was named in 1982, he
spent nine months traveling between
State College and Austin, where he was
executive vice chancellor for academic
affairs for the University of Texas sys
tem. Thomas will have to carry on his
transition at a greater intensity, Jordan
said.
Thomas toured the University Park
campus two weeks ago, before he was
designated the leading candidate, Huck
said. Other candidates have done the
same to get a feeling for the campus
before deciding whether to commit to
Penn State.
During that visit Thomas met with
some faculty members, but no student
groups. After the board votes Monday,
he will meet members of the search
committee, Huck said. Thomas has met
only with Thomas Merritt, the commit
tee's chairman.
Beginning next week, Thomas will
meet with Jordan to begin the transition
process. Huck said he has also made an
appointment for Thomas to meet with
Gov. Robert P. Casey next week after
the board's vote.
Jordan said he anticipates Thomas
will make some adjustments to the Uni
versity's administrative structure to
suit his management style. When Jor
dan took office in 1983, he implemented
an executive vice president position
which he combined with the office of the
provost the University's chief aca
demic officer.
Thursday, July 19, 1990
Vol. 91, No. 25 12 pages University Park, Pa. 16801
Published independently by students at Penn State
kc , 1990 Collegian Inc.
Thomas not
concerned
with victory
Former president
stresses academics
Thomas hired
Curry, who only won
31 of 78 games while
head coach of
Georgia Tech but had
built a program on a
reputation of
integrity.. This
irritated many Tide
fans.
By TOM ESTERLY
Collegian Sports Writer
As president of the University of Ala
bama, Joab L. Thomas hired Bill Cur
ry, a football coach with a losing record
but an emphasis on academics.
Thomas' committment to academics
may have made him unpopular with
Alabama fans. But his academic integ
rity is one of the reasons he is the finalist
for Penn State's presidency, said
J. Lloyd Huck, president of the Univer
sity's Board of Trustees.
Thomas' criteria for a football coach
to replace Ray Perkins in 1986 did not
emphasize winning, according to The
Atlanta Constitution.
He said he was looking for "first a
person whose integrity is above ques
tion, second someone who will be sin
cerely interested in helping improve the
academic performance of our student
athletes, and third someone who can
win."
Thomas hired Curry, who only won 31
of 78 games while head coach of
Georgia Tech but had built a program
on a reputation of integrity. This irri
tated many Tide fans used to the lead-
Please see ATHLETICS, Page 5.
visit but "he clearly accepted the invitation."
It was the first time in the 41-year history of the
Western alliance that its top official had traveled to
the Soviet Union.
"I think we opened the doors for a new era of coop
eration," Woerner said.
"I explained to the Soviet leadership we wanted to
have a sincere partnership in the future . . . not only
with them but with all countries of Central and East
ern Europe." he said.
Antall's visit symbolized the new turn in relations,
he said.
The Hungarian leader said he supported the "Atlan
tic idea," a reference to the political links drawing
together the United States and Canada with nations
in Europe.
"Two world wars and a cold war have proved that
Europe and North America are inseparable," Antall
said in brief remarks in the main lobby of the alliance
headquarters.
He said NATO should form "a basis for European
security and this is not directed against the Soviet
Union."