New president plans to tell Xavier’s story ‘more loudly’
29th February 2016 · 0 Comments
By Michael Patrick Welch
Contributing Writer
On February 27, nine months into his new job, C. Reynold Verret, 61, was formally inaugurated as Xavier University’s new president.
Verret’s family first fled to America from his home country of Haiti in 1963, settling finally in Brooklyn, New York. His accomplishments since then would be impressive even without his immigrant story: He earned his undergrad degree in biochemistry from Colombia University, his Ph.D. in biochemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and went on to serve as a postdoctoral fellow at the Howard Hughes Institute for Immunology at Yale University and the Center for Cancer Research at MIT.Dr. Verret joins Xavier from Savannah State University where he served as provost and chief academic officer from 2012.
Over two decades ago, Dr. Verret moved to New Orleans to teach at Tulane. “New Orleans was a new city for me at the time,” says Dr. Verret. “I discovered the similarities to Haiti really after I arrived here. When I tasted the rice and beans there was that feeling of, ‘Oh this looks like something I’ve seen before!’ New Orleans is clearly the Creole culture of old Haiti. And today New Orleans is even more of a true melting pot, with new people coming to NOLA that I have not seen previously—plus the Haitian population has grown too, since I have been here.”
Dr. Verret’s biochemistry background makes him a good fit for Xavier, which sends more black Americans on to medical school than any other college, as documented in a recent NYT magazine piece. Xavier boasts an even higher number of Black graduates in biology and physics. The school has worked its way through post-Katrina challenges by focusing on building up its STEM education—whereas Dr. Verret has helped develop programs to prepare STEM teachers, secure tuition support for teacher certification in STEM fields, among other similar accomplishments. As chair of the Chemistry department at Clark Atlanta University, he increased research extramural funding by almost $10 million.
But Dr. Verret says Xavier picked him out of 300 candidates for other reasons. He stresses his extensive experience dealing with issues such as declining enrollment, retention and graduation rates. “The post-Katrina changes have been somewhat striking,” he admits of the storm that, for a while there, chopped Xavier’s 3,000-member student body almost in half. “We’ve been dealing with some challenges of how we communicate ourselves, to keep students at Xavier.”
How specifically will he fight these problems, which many American universities currently face? “I have faced issues of retention, and what we must do is look at the individual challenges the students face,” Dr. Verret explains. “Preparation is important: one’s education at Xavier depends on the education they’ve had before. New Orleans has had educational challenges, and we’ve had this new experiment in K through 12 with Charter Schools. It’s important to make sure they are readying the students for Xavier. We must understand what each student’s gaps are and fill their particular gap. We need an advising system that addresses student issues early not late. And that will help retention at Xavier.”
Dr. Verret is also laser-focused on affordability. “We have a bifurcation of students in some very wealthy schools,” he explains. “We have students that have modest means—and I can’t stand the idea of losing a great mind because of affordability. Education is not just about what that student gets, but how society benefits from that student’s education— everybody gets richer.” He speaks of fundraising to pay for scholarships for low-income students.
These problems are not specific to Xavier—whereas this recent new phase of Louisiana’s seemingly never-ending budget crisis could potentially hurt the historically Black university. “That will become a larger problem if we don’t come to solutions in special session,” he says calmly. “We have about $19 million in student support from TOPS. Louisiana’s best and brightest would lose out with that cut, and Louisiana would be poorer for not educating those students. If the special session doesn’t come to fruition, Louisiana will be impoverished. We would not be taking one step backwards but three, or four, or even five steps backwards.”
While the potential cuts don’t thrill Dr. Verret, he says that sometimes an emergency is what gets things going, and makes things happen—sort of a “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” philosophy. He avoids the topic of which programs might receive cuts, and says he and his staff will begin working on solutions once new Governor John Bel Edwards’s budget decisions are actually made.
Until then he will work on better marketing Xavier. He believes the college’s reputation could buttress it through this current financial storm. “Xavier has a reputation for quality and rigor,” he says. “We’re one of the schools that really proves and shows you what is possible with higher education. We have a great story to tell, and we want to make sure more people hear it. We simply need to tell Xavier’s story more loudly.”
Lastly, Dr. Verret believes he was hired for his interdisciplinary approach to learning. He plans to add more graduate classes that combine relevant subjects. “We want to create, say, scientists who have a good understanding of the humanities,” he says. “This modern world needs people who can communicate across disciplines.”
Dr. Verret’s new assignment means the first time the Xavier Board of Trustees has ever selected a new president. In 1925, the religious order Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament established the university, and in 1968 promoted Dr. Norman Francis to the presidency, an office he would hold for 47 years. An internet search would lead one to mistakenly believe that Dr. Francis was Xavier’s only president, his legend looms that large: As a Xavier student himself, Norman facilitated the Freedom Riders staying at Xavier’s dorms. After his graduation from Xavier with a bachelor’s degree, in 1952, he became one of two African-American students selected to integrate Loyola University Law School, and in 1955, became the school’s first Black graduate. He went on to chair the Louisiana Recovery Authority after Katrina and Rita, and once received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Dr. Verret continues a longtime friendship with Dr. Norman and, these days, the new president keeps Norman on speed-dial. “He has given me a lot of advice. And what I have learned from him is basically speak to people, get the right information, and address the issues that are important for this time. He did that many times, including when Katrina happened but many times before,” says Dr. Verret, who adds that Dr. Norman currently encourages him to be bold: “Taking risks is really part of what we do,” Dr. Verret believes. “‘You can always go beyond boundaries and expand your programs,’ Dr. Norman tells me, ‘You don’t have to respect boundaries.’”
This article originally published in the February 29, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
