TMC PULSE

t m c » p u l s e | a p r i l 2 0 1 5 11 TMC SPOTLIGHT THOUGH IT WAS A "COINCIDENCE" THAT FIRST LANDED DAVID W. LEEBRON IN ACADEMIA, TODAY HE PROUDLY SERVES AS PRESIDENT OF RICE UNIVERSITY. HE SAT DOWN WITH TEXAS MEDICAL CENTER EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF STRATEGY AND OPERATING OFFICER WILLIAM F. McKEON FOR A LOOK AT THE UNIVERSITY'S GROWTH DURING HIS 11-YEAR TENURE—FROM A LARGER AND MORE DIVERSE STUDENT POPULATION, TO A RENEWED COMMITMENT TO THE ARTS. The student body has been fundamentally transformed—it is much more diverse, national and international, as befits an internationally renowned research university. Q | Can you tell us about your forma- tive years? A | I grew up in a suburb of Philadelphia and was the second of five children. And so far as I can remember, I had a good childhood, with a wonderful family. My brother is a writer, and I tell my children that they can be anything they want to be except a writer, because the first thing that most writers write about is their dysfunctional families. I went to a small Quaker school in Philadelphia, the William Penn Charter School, even though I'm not Quaker. It was a great education. I am very loyal to my high school and grateful for the values and perspectives that it inspired in me. I grew up with probably more interest in science than other sub- jects. International experiences were also an important part of my teenage years. I took my first overseas trip to Scandinavia with the Boy Scouts when I was 13, and then when I was 16 I went back as an exchange student in Germany. And then my family hosted a string of visitors from Sweden, Switzerland, Mexico, Japan and Germany. So that was a somewhat different aspect of growing up in a suburb of Philadelphia. Q | I find it interesting that your undergraduate degree from Harvard is in history and science. That is unique. A | My mother did want me to be a doctor, so I was trying to humor her, although I didn't think that was a likely outcome. And I was interested in sci- ence even though I didn't think science would be my career. I just liked science. So I was looking for a major that would allow me to do some of the things I wanted to do. I came upon this major that was administered by the Department of History of Science, but it was called history and science, because they thought it was too narrow just to study the history of science. Thus the major would include some science courses, and some history courses, and some history of science courses—courses that ranged from 19th century German history to advanced cellular biology. Q | When you were heading the Law Review, did you anticipate a career in academia? A | Not really. Although some of my friends in law school thought I should be an academic, I didn't actually have any particular interest in being an aca- demic. I decided to clerk for a judge fol- lowing law school, applied only to one, and ultimately went out to Los Angeles to clerk for her. She promptly resigned. Really, it was not my fault. She resigned to become the first secretary of edu- cation. So there I was in Los Angeles, having made this big decision to go out to Los Angeles specifically to clerk for this federal judge, and I was jobless. So I had to figure out what I was going to do. Through a total coincidence, some folks at UCLA had called me about some colleagues of mine in law school, to ask whether I thought they would be interested in academia. After we talked about that, the person from UCLA said, 'Well, now that your judge has resigned, what are you going to do?' I said, 'I don't know. Maybe I will work for a law firm, maybe I will teach. I don't know. But I think I would like to stay out here in L.A. for a while.' So he said, 'Well, let me get back to you.' It turned out UCLA had a professor who was on leave in New York and was supposed to come back to teach a course in the spring and didn't want to come back. So they said, 'Would you be interested in teaching this basic course for first-year law students?' The course was called torts. So I went to UCLA in the spring and taught torts, and had a great time. But then I left and traveled around the world for about four months. I thought I was going to go back to Philadelphia and get a job, and then I realized I didn't really know anyone in Philadelphia any- more except my family. I decided that I wanted to go to New York instead. So I got a job with a law firm there. But I didn't enjoy the private prac- tice of law that much. I thought, 'Gee, that teaching thing was pretty good.' And so I went on the teaching market, and received a few job offers and ended up at NYU. Q | Can you share with us your perspective of how Rice University has changed during your tenure? A | Rice was a great place, and I had great predecessors, each of whom had made a terrific contribution to the insti- tution, and some in areas I am inter- ested in. But people talked about Rice being 'behind the hedges,' and students getting outside of the hedges. Rice was seen as quite separate from the city, and many people came to Rice despite the fact that it was in Houston, instead of because it was in Houston. So that's one thing that was important to me. This was an urban university, and we needed to take advantage of that. The second issue is what were its relationships globally? And at that time, we had very little going on in Latin America and in China. We really focused on that. Here we are in Houston, and Latin America had to be a big piece of what we were trying to achieve. China is a great set of opportunities for us. Thus, that was also a focus. We looked at some of the issues around size. We were a very small university. So we decided to grow 30 percent. At Rice, that's not a huge absolute number, about 900 more undergraduate students. But you will find very few universities that have undertaken growth at that percentage level. And that allowed us to be much more national and international. So a big priority was building out the reputa- tion of the university. A lot of that has to do with where your students are coming from. And then, having great people in public affairs who can get the word out. Another thing was that the univer- sity needed to be really, really clear about its mission and ambition. Rice has had conflicted identities at differ- ent times. We really delayed participa- tion in the federal research programs, and didn't take any federal research money until the 1960s. We had some extraordinary programs, including in nanotechnology and bioengineer- ing, but we needed to strengthen our research profile. We also weren't as diverse a uni- versity as we could have been. Today we are one of the most diverse elite private universities in the country. We are the only member of the Association of American Universities on Princeton Review's ranking of the top 10 for interaction among students of differ- ent socioeconomic, racial and ethnic backgrounds. AAU is made up of the 60-some best research universities in the country, public and private, and Rice is the only one on that list. Today, we have no majority ethnic or racial population on the campus, much like our home city of Houston. The student body has been fundamen- tally transformed—it is much more diverse, national and international, as befits an internationally renowned research university.

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