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Q-and-A: Brown President Ruth Simmons, soon-to-be Princeton trustee
Published: Monday, June 18th, 2012
At the beginning of next month, outgoing Brown president Ruth Simmons will trade schools with Wilson School dean Christina Paxson — Paxson will succeed Simmons in Providence as Brown’s 19th president, and Simmons will join Princeton’s Board of Trustees ...
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Why do you say "She joined the Princeton faculty in 1983 as a professor of Romance languages"? My recollection is that she was the director of studies at Butler college in 1983 (Princeton has since split those positions in two, the "dean" and the "director of studies."). Every internet source I can find (NYTimes bio upon becoming president of Smith, Brown bio, etc.) lists her time at Princeton as administrative, not as a professor. It is true that Princeton's directors of studies are usually qualified to teach in their disciplines, so she might have taught an occasional course, but she has been an administrator for well over 30 years.
Does she get paid to serve on the Board of Trustees? Simmons more than doubled her salary at Brown by picking up paycheck after paycheck for serving on various boards of directors.
Simmons has a doctorate in, I believe, French from Harvard but is no scholar. Pres. Shapiro mentored her and encouraged her to join corporate boards, as he had down at UMichigan and then at Princeton, most notoriously his 20 yrs. on the board of Dow Chemical. Simmons' most controversial board experience was on the board of Goldman Sachs, where she was one of the handful of directors who approved huge salary/bonus increases for top executives. Like Shapiro, so with Simmons, making leading universities oases of corporate values was job no. 1.