Chronicle of Higher Ed-President Quits at New College of Calif.

The Chronicle of Higher Education

Money & Management

From the issue dated August 17, 2007

President Quits at New College ofCalif.

By SCOTT SMALLWOOD and PAUL FAIN

The president of New College of California resigned just weeks after its accreditor issued a scathing report that placed the experimental liberal-arts college on probation.

Martin J. Hamilton, president of the college for five years, had initially said he would see the college through the probation and then step down next year. But this month he announced that he was leaving immediately. “The current political and financial challenges have made it impossible for me to continue in this role,” he said in a written statement. Two other college officials have also resigned in recent weeks.

The Board of Trustees, while saying it did not agree with all the criticisms from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, announced it would comply with the accreditation standards. The trustees appointed Luis G. Molina, a San Francisco lawyer who sits on the board, as acting president and directed him to start a search for an interim president.

Bizarre details emerged in the critical report from the accreditor, including the case of an international student who may have received preferential treatment after promising to give the college a large donation.

Although the evidence is murky, the report found that college officials, with the president’s approval, may have improperly changed the student’s grades and added class credits. Word spread around the San Francisco campus that the student, who sources say is from Nepal, had pledged $1-million to the college. That money did not come through, and the student said his money was frozen in Nepal for political reasons.

Neither Mr. Hamilton nor Mr. Molina responded to interview requests last week.

A July letter to Mr. Hamilton from the accreditor outlined the serious problems found by its investigators. According to Ralph A. Wolff, president of the senior-college division of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, his team found “clear and egregious violations of institutional integrity, academic integrity, and other basic tenets” of accreditation.

The sharply worded letter notes that New College has a “culture of administrative sloppiness and arbitrariness.” It reports problems with admissions, the awarding of academic credit, grade changes, and lax record keeping. The association also criticized Mr. Hamilton’s “unbridled presidential authority” and said that a lack of faculty governance was a central problem.

Mr. Hamilton has said that the criticisms have merit but that some of them are petty and fail to acknowledge the special mission of New College.

His resignation statement was full of sadness: “This is a symbolic death of everything I have fought so hard to represent. I hope and pray that New College will pull together and overcome these most serious of self-inflicted wounds.”