The Legacy of Learning: Four Deans Speak Out.

David C. Knapp (1968-1974) steered the college through its reorganization in 1969 and its name change. The Division of Nutritional Sciences was also established during his tenure. While dean, Knapp served as acting provost for six months and was appointed university provost in 1974, a position he held for four years. In 1978 he became president of the University of Massachusetts. He retired in 1991.

The years 1 was dean were pretty turbulent, but exciting and challenging. Student activism and protests were at their height. We were in borderline upheaval all the time. The turmoil on campus affected the changes happening at the college. There was a feeling that the fields of study in the college had a lot of relevance to the social problems of the day. I think it's important for people to study more than abstract concepts, to look at what they're studying in the context of reality, " he says.

Jean Failing (1974-1978) capped a nearly 40-year career at Cornell with her appointment as dean. Her personal connections with hundreds of students, going back to her days as a class adviser during the World War II years, helped her launch the college's first fund-raising drive for private funds in 1975. The three-year campaign exceeded its $250,000 goal.

During her tenure as dean, Failing helped establish the Family Life Development Center as a permanent program and brought the college's faculty and research to the people of New York State through a series of annual human ecology institutes. She also served as program chair of several land grant college association committees and chair of the Northeast Region of Administrators of Home Economics. Failing observes that many of her accomplishments as dean were facilitated by "learning how to work with the other divisions of the university in order to accomplish what we were doing."

Jerome M. Ziegler (1978-1988) is proudest of increasing the diversity of the college's student body. "I thought that as a state-supported institution we should be regarded by multicultural families in New York State as a good place to send their kids. I believed we ought to have about the same percentage of nonwhite students as there were nonwhite people in New York State, and we achieved that while-I-was here."

Zielger was particularly interested in improving the depth and breadth of Human Ecology's undergraduate education. He brought new programs in international and experimental study, increased Cornell Cooperative Extension's role in urban areas of New York State, and gave students more opportunities to study in urban environments and overseas by expanding the Field Study program. "Most of our students come from urban areas and are probably going to work in cities," he says. "They need to study what makes urban culture and society what it is."

Francille M. Firebaugh (1988-1999) takes pride in the formation of the Department of Policy Analysis and Management during her administration as well as the continuous academic improvement in the quality of the college's undergraduates. The first endowed professorships and the Bronfenbrenner Life Course Center also were established. During the Cornell capital campaign (1990-1995), the college more than doubled its goal. becoming a $34 million component of the university's $1.25 billion campaign. Firebaugh also spearheaded efforts to secure funding for Martha. Van Rensselaer Hall's west wing addition and the MVR courtyard and walkway.

Firebaugh describes the college in terms of disciplines that range from the physical, biological, and social sciences to the aesthetic. "But what struck me about all faculty members was the commitment from each one to the human condition," she observes.