Making leaders that last
Russell Lowery-Hart, who was a fellow in the Rising Presidents Fellowship’s first cohort, and returned this year as a mentor, said that participating in the program was pivotal to his career success.
“When I started here, my presidency was at risk, and now I’m coming in as a mentor whose college just won the Aspen prize,” he said. “Coming here to Stanford I’m reminded of where I came from — including all of the learning, pain, fear, and uncertainty — and how I was able to act on the things that I learned here.”
Lowery-Hart is the first Rising Presidents Fellow to win the Aspen Prize for Community College Excel, an annual award given to U.S. community colleges. Over the last seven years the program has graduated more than 300 fellows, some of whom now lead 9% of community colleges in the United States, according to Palmer.
“In that first cohort we met at Stanford twice and I left with knowledge and understanding that showed me where I was failing in my presidency,” said Lowery-Hart who was also recently announced as the new chancellor of the Austin Community College District after serving as president of Amarillo College for nearly a decade.
“The work that Russell’s done to change the culture of Amarillo College is amazing,” said Maria Harper-Marinick, a senior fellow at the Aspen Institute and Lowery-Hart’s former mentor in the program. “Building a culture of caring within an educational setting is not something everyone gets to accomplish but he stayed focused on that.”
In one of the program’s final on-campus sessions last month, Bettinger encouraged fellows to lead by tapping into both data and people resources as they go on to lead at educational institutions.
“As the president of a school, you have the opportunity to see things from a panoramic view, but you’ve got to rely on others to help inform your decisions,” he said. “That requires that you be curious, inquisitive, and thoughtful.”
While the formal partnership between the GSE and Aspen has ended, Wyner and Palmer said that the relationships will continue into the future.
“This has been a meaningful partnership for Stanford, and we’re so grateful to have supported these education leaders in their journey,” Palmer said.