Incoming President Draws Praise
New Leader Deemed 'the Right Choice at the Right Time'

By Susan Kinzie
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 6, 2006

Steven Knapp comes to the presidency of George Washington University by way of Yale, Cornell, UC-Berkeley and Johns Hopkins, where he has been provost for the past 10 years and helped land a $50 million gift, just announced. He continued teaching English literature even as he handled major crises at Hopkins, testified before Congress and led the school when the president was out of town.

As if that weren't enough, he's such an accomplished musician that he considered a career as a drummer. And he and his wife run a sheep farm.

Their family fleece was -- what else? -- Maryland state champ this year at the fair.

George Washington got just the well-rounded and impressive leader it was looking for, many people on and off campus said yesterday, someone with the academic credentials, fundraising experience and skills to push the school to become a more ambitious and better endowed research institution.

"He is just the right choice at the right time. . . . Everything is a plus," said Lilien Robinson, chairwoman of the executive committee of the faculty senate. "I don't see any minuses."

Lamar Thorpe, head of the student association, said, "Everyone on campus is happy."

Knapp has a very different personal style from that of Stephen J. Trachtenberg, who will step down in the summer after nearly 19 years as president. Trachtenberg is credited with pushing the school into greater national prominence, being innovative and transforming the physical landscape at the downtown university. He's a dramatic figure, a talker, a storyteller, a showman. He's blunt and sometimes divisive.

Knapp is quieter, more modest, more low-key, more of a consensus-builder, his colleagues said. He has a great sense of humor, said Randolph-Macon College President Robert Lindgren, who worked with Knapp at Hopkins, but not in a dramatic way; he's someone who can laugh about the irony of things and keep meetings light. "Steve is a fellow who wears very well," Lindgren said.

In an interview yesterday, Knapp talked about his vision for the school, the challenges he sees ahead -- and the family's sheep.

"It's nice to have a spread of activity," he said. "It keeps you healthy, I think. It gives you a balance on things.

"In the sheep business," he added, "I don't do much of the strategic thinking. I do the manual labor." He described cleaning the hooves -- or trying to clean the hooves -- of a very reluctant, and extremely strong, sheep recently. "I was wrestling. This was a sheep that wasn't crazy about the idea."

His wife runs the farm, north of Baltimore, which they'll keep when they move into the president's house at GWU this summer. He will begin the job Aug. 1.

School officials would not disclose his salary.

Knapp grew up in New Jersey, planned on a career as a professional drummer (mostly jazz and, more recently, world music, playing hand drums) but decided to go to Yale to explore other interests, including literature, history and political science. He went on to Cornell for a doctorate in English and taught for16 years at Berkeley, specializing in 18th- and 19th-century British literature.

He came to Hopkins as dean of the School of Arts and Sciences and soon moved on to become provost and senior vice president for academic affairs. He had a stronger role there than many provosts -- the board rewrote the bylaws to reflect the new responsibilities -- serving as acting president when William R. Brody was off campus, fundraising, helping expand overseas campuses and handling crises including murders, the death of a volunteer at the medical center and recent protests over race relations at the school. He worked closely with William Polk Carey, whose $50 million donation will allow Hopkins to establish business and education schools.

At GWU, a 20,000-student school with a medical center and a particular focus on topics important in Washington, including politics, international relations and public policy, Knapp will have a more public role.

Some of his biggest challenges are likely to come from the city, said David Ward, president of the American Council on Education, from neighbors and political leaders as the university moves forward with a 20-year campus plan.

There's a lack of trust between the community and the university, which has grown rapidly over the years of Trachtenberg's tenure, said Joy Howell, president of the Foggy Bottom Association. "We have a rampant developer in our midst. . . .

"Our hope is that he would be someone who will keep his word to the community and guide GW's growth in a way that makes GW a good neighbor for the rest of Foggy Bottom," she said.

Knapp said he looks forward to working with neighbors, "strengthening and deepening ties to the community" and taking advantage of all the city has to offer.

He said he is interested in building research, raising more money, increasing diversity of faculty and students and bolstering international programs.

The most important question he had when talking with GWU officials, he said, was: "Are you happy with the way things are here, or is there more to be done?" He kept asking what their aspirations were and whether the will was there to accomplish them.

Major change is ahead for the campus, he said -- not taking off in a completely new direction, but building on what's there to make GWU a top-tier research university.

He's got what it takes to make that vision a reality, said trustee W. Russell Ramsey, who headed the presidential search committee

"Steve obviously has got great depth and background knowledge and expertise." He laughed, thinking of the sheep. "And the physical strength to wrestle things to the ground."