University Business - July 2006 - (Page 48)

Diamond in the Mudd And Klawe does make a point to be part of students' lives. After Mingst. Mudd ranks second in the nation in percentage of women a semester of work on a research project, Kenrick Kin remembers engineering faculty. Gender aside, it was Klawe's appearance on paper that first caught being invited to her home for ice cream along with the other stu- presidential search committee eyes. She had been an academic de- dent team members. It's hard to get to know everyone, but Maria partment head, a vice president of student/academic services, and genuinely tries to, says Kin, who got encouragement from his then a dean. She had worked at an IBM research center. When the dean and advisor when applying for graduate school. Despite her career in higher ed, Klawe knows the K-12 world search began a year ago, Klawe was taking Princeton University by storm. Beginning her third year there as dean of its School of Engi- well. For several years, she introduced hands-on activities to young neering and Applied Sciences, she was successfully making that aca- students so they'd know there's more to math and science than arith- demic area more welcoming and accessible to the rest of the univer- metic. She launched a project on using computer games in math sity community, despite its physical location on the edge of campus. education, and then co-founded an educational software company. The thing that scares me the most is that we would think it was It's a background that just covered everything we wanted to cover, amazingly bad for an educated person to not be able to read but sums up Mingst, co-chair of the search committee. In the months to come, Klawe's enthusiasm, energy, and opti- for some reason we think it's okay for an educated person to say, `I'm mism along with her warm, casual demeanor would win over not good at math,' Klawe says. I really want our culture to value members of that committee, which also included Hart and Van having our students learning math and science in high school and Ryswyk. No doubt, Klawe is multi-faceted in the roles she plays: continuing [the subjects] in college. creative collaborator, educator, prob- lem solver, lifelong learner, leader, bridge I'm a better [meeting] participant builder, and now, of course, Mudder. when I'm painting. It keeps me Creative Collaborator If one walked by an all-day meeting in quieter. Usually in a meeting I want progress and just spotted Klawe, it might appear to be a class in watercolor paint- to say something about everything. ing. Only a closer room scan would reveal Klawe's passion for education attracted her to a small college that Klawe is the lone paintbrush-in-hand participant. Besides any meeting notes, surrounding her are some brushes, paint tubes, a like Mudd. It's possible to be president but be very close to stu- dents and faculty, and have the opportunity in later years to ei- small mixing tray, and a watercolor block. I'm a better participant when I'm painting, she contends. I'm ther teach or do research or both, she says. listening to everything but it keeps me quieter. Usually in a meet- ing I want to say something about everything. If I'm painting, it Problem Solver brings me down to a much more normal level. Those who have Klawe enjoys the challenge of tackling problems not just in class, been in both types of meetings with her have agreed. but through research and on campus as well. For Klawe, that unconventional approach simply makes sense, She is particularly committed to investigating how technology says Sarah Moore, a 2006 Princeton grad. It fits with the rest of can support the lives of people with aphasia, a disorder that affects a who she is, someone who incorporates many passions into her daily person's ability to speak, read, and write as well as understand spoken life, and who can make any setting comfortable and informal. words. Aphasia struck Klawe's friend Anita Borg, founder of The Van Ryswyk says Klawe has a reputation for being disarmingly Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology. She was diagnosed informal. I'd almost characterize her as sort of a `Birkenstocks on the during treatment for a brain tumor which later took her life . coffee table' kind of person. But he and others at Mudd see that Then at the University of British Columbia, Klawe launched it's not at all a sloppiness. She's just very at ease with herself. The Aphasia Project. I realized Anita could still deal with numbers and images, even though she could no longer read and write, Klawe Educator says, adding that this made even simple tasks like writing down a That sense of comfort may be why students going through an aca- doctor's appointment impossible. That's when she envisioned a tool demic confidence crisis seek out Klawe. Assurances like you can do that uses images and sounds as substitutes for written words. Klawe had already committed to joining Princeton by that time, this, you'll get through this often help students to continue trying. The emotional connection that develops with students is what and soon after her arrival she found some students interested in the she likes best as an educator. You're getting to be part of their lives project. Now it's a collaboration between both schools. Klawe's problem-solving instincts also kicked in when she at a time when they're making choices and decisions about what learned that Princeton's first-year engineering students often feel they're going to try to do with the rest of their life, she says. 48 | July 2006 universitybusiness.com 84 ddni.ewalK.M MP 83:35:2 60/12/6 http://universitybusiness.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of University Business - July 2006

Contents
College Index
Advisory Board
Company Index
Editor's Note
People Watch
Sense of Place
Stats Watcch
Viewpoint
Marketing
Human Resources
Future Shock
Money Matters
Community Colleges
Diamond in the Mudd
Higher Ed at the Crossroads
Property Values
The President Next Door
Good Medicine
The Outs (and Ins) of Facility Management
Business Technology
What's New
Calendar of Events
Direct Connect
End Note

University Business - July 2006