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Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York

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Coordinates: 40°48′30″N 73°57′43″W / 40.80826°N 73.96188°W / 40.80826; -73.96188
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The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York is the governing board of Columbia University in New York City. Founded in 1754, it is sometimes referred to as the Columbia Corporation. The Trustees of Columbia University is a 501(c)3 and the owner of the property and real assets of the university.[1] They are legally distinct from affiliates of the university, which include Barnard College, Jewish Theological Seminary, Teachers College, and Union Theological Seminary, which are themselves separate legal entities.

The board of trustees was originally composed of ex officio members including officials from the New York colonial government, crown officials, and various Protestant ministers from the city. Following the college's resuscitation following the American Revolutionary War, it was placed under the control of the Board of Regents of the University of the State of New York, and the university would finally come under the control of a private board of trustees in 1787. The board is notable for having administered the Pulitzer Prize from the prize's establishment until 1975.

As of 2024, the trustees consists of 21 members and is co-chaired by David Greenwald and Claire Shipman.

Structure and function

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The Trustees' Room in Low Memorial Library

The board is governed by a maximum of 24 trustees, including the president of the university, who serves ex officio. Six of the 24 candidates are nominated from a pool of candidates selected by the Columbia Alumni Association. Another six are nominated by the board in consultation with the University Senate. The remaining 12 are nominated by the trustees through an internal process.[2] The board elects its own chair; the first woman to serve as chair, and the first to chair the governing board of any Ivy League university, was Gertrude Michelson, elected in 1989.[3] The term of office for the trustees is six years and trustees serve for no more than two consecutive terms.[2]

The trustees have met in dedicated room in Low Memorial Library since 1897.[4] They select the President, oversee all faculty and senior administrative appointments, monitor the budget, supervise the endowment, and protect university property.[5] The board of trustees holds the exclusive power to grant degrees, including, by memoranda of understanding, to the affiliated institutions of Barnard College and Teachers College. The trustees also oversaw the Pulitzer Prizes until 1975, when authority over the prizes was devolved to a separate board.[6]

Early history

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The charter of King's College, issued by George II of Great Britain in 1754

The board of trustees was originally established in 1754 as the board of governors of King's College with 41 members, replacing the ten-member Lottery Commission appointed by the New York Assembly to oversee lottery funds allocated to the establishment of the college.[7] The board of governors originally included several ex officio members, including, crown officials, members of the colonial government, and ministers of various Protestant denominations:[8]

College Hall was the first building at Columbia until its demolition in 1857. Its cornerstone is installed in the Trustees' Room.

A further twenty-four individuals were named in the charter, serving without terms with their successors to be selected by subsequent governors. College faculty were not provided seats ex officio on the board of governors, at variance with contemporary practice at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, where the faculty was engaged in the governance of their colleges, but was very much in line with practice of other colonial colleges governed by external boards.[9]

The charter permitted Protestants to serve as governors but excluded Roman Catholics and Jews. Only three members would be Anglicans: the Archbishop of Canterbury, the rector of Trinity Church, and the President of Columbia University, and they were offset by four ex officio members selected from New York's Dutch Reformed Church, French Protestant church, Lutheran Church, and Presbyterian Church.[9] In practice, the board was dominated by Anglicans, members of the Trinity Church, and the Dutch Reformed Church. Of the fifty-nine men who served as governors, only three ex officio members were not from the Anglican or Dutch Reformed churches.

More than half of the fifty-nine New Yorkers who served as governor made their livings as merchants. The next most common occupation among the governors was law (20 percent), followed by ministers (16 percent), and there was only one doctor.[10] The governors met 102 times in 22 years and most meetings were attended by around fifteen governors. A quarter of the governors attended fewer than ten meetings, and another half were absent, leaving a core of sixteen governors. Academic matters such as faculty appointments, the curriculum, and admissions requirements were overseen by degree-bearing ministers, while governors drawing from the city's mercantile and legal ranks oversaw financial matters such as construction of collegiate buildings or the salary of the college steward. This informal division of duties survived the reorganization of the King's College into Columbia College and persisted into the 1960s.[11]

In terms of politics, the ratio of Loyalists to Patriots during the American Revolution among the governors was more than eight to one.[12] The college was severely affected by the revolutionary war, which forced the college to shut down for eight years and a number of governors fled to Canada and the West Indies.

In 1784, it became the Board of Regents of Columbia College after the former King's College was reinstated. The 1784 charter also stipulated that eight of the seats on the board should be held by ranking state officials ex officio, with the remaining 24 regents to be appointed, two each, from the state's 12 counties, with only three places reserved for New York City residents. The number of regents was subsequently expanded to 33 by the New York State Legislature, with 20 of them residents of New York City, including a mix of prominent politicians and clergymen such as John Jay, Samuel Provoost, Leonard Lispenard, Gershom Mendes Seixas, and John Daniel Gros.[7]

It was renamed in a new 1787 charter as the Trustees of Columbia College in the City of New York, and the college was relieved of its duties as a state institution, returning to earlier status as a privately governed college serving the city. None of the college's trustees were to be state officials, and all replacements were to be elected by incumbent board members.[7] Only until 1908 did the board start accepting alumni nominations.

The board arrived at its final name of The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York by an order from the Supreme Court of New York in 1912, 16 years after Columbia College was renamed as Columbia University.[4][13]

Controversies

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Low Memorial Library

Although the trustees usually approve faculty recommendations for hiring and dismissal of Columbia faculty, in some cases they have taken a more direct role. Notably, in 1917 they fired psychologist James McKeen Cattell for his anti-war and anti-conscription views, a case significant in the history of academic freedom.[14][15]

The trustees' oversight of the Pulitzer Prizes, which ended in 1975, was not without controversy. An early example of this occurred in 1921, when the trustees overruled the jury recommendation and awarded the fiction prize to Edith Wharton for The Age of Innocence instead of the recommendation of Sinclair Lewis for Main Street.[16] A similar controversy ensued in 1962, when the trustees overruled the jury's choice of a biography of William Randolph Hearst by W. A. Swanberg, Citizen Hearst, instead choosing to give no award in that category.[17][18]

The trustees have been blamed for the violent suppression of protestors in the Columbia University protests of 1968, after they instructed the university administration to call in the police against the protestors and later lauded the police for their efforts.[19]

In 2001, the trustees were accused of pressuring the university to water down its sexual misconduct policy, and the director of the Office of Sexual Misconduct Prevention and Education resigned in protest, claiming that the trustees had directed her not to discuss the policy changes.[20]

As with most governing boards of private universities, the deliberations of the trustees are confidential, and despite any internal disagreements the trustees generally present a unified front to the public on the decisions they have taken. A notable exception to this occurred in 2012, when trustee José A. Cabranes published a dissenting opinion on the status of Columbia College and its core curriculum within the university, in a column in Columbia's student newspaper, the Columbia Daily Spectator.[21]

During the 2024 Columbia University pro-Palestinian campus occupation a group of 21 members of the United States House of Representatives suggested that the trustees resign if they were unwilling to call in the NYPD to arrest student protestors.[22]

Current trustees

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The board consists of the following 20 members as of October 2024:[23]

Name Columbia Degree(s) Occupation
David Greenwald (Co- Chair) JD 1983 chairman of Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson
Claire Shipman (Co-Chair) BA 1986, MIA 1994 senior national correspondent for Good Morning America
Abigail Black Elbaum (Vice Chair) BA 1992, MBA 1994 co-founder and principal of Ogden CAP Properties
Mark Gallogly (Vice Chair) MBA 1986 co-managing partner and founder of Centerbridge Partners
Victor Mendelson (Vice Chair) BA 1989 co-president and director of HEICO
Katrina Armstrong None Interim President of Columbia University
Andrew F. Barth BA 1983, MBA 1985 former chairman of Capital Guardian Trust Company
Dean Dakolias BS 1989 co-CIO of the credit funds group at Fortress Investment Group
Duchesne Drew BA 1989 President of Minnesota Public Radio
Keith Goggin MS 1991 market maker on NYSE
James Gorman MBA 1987 Former CEO of Morgan Stanley 2010-2024
Kikka Hanazawa BA 2000 social entrepreneur
Jeh Johnson JD 1982 partner at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, United States Secretary of Homeland Security from 2013 to 2017
Adam Pritzker BA 2008 co-founder and chairman of General Assembly
Jonathan Rosand BA 1989, MD 1994 Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School
Shoshana Shendelman MA 2003, MSc 2004, PhD 2005 Founder, Chief Executive Officer and Chair of the Board of Directors at Applied Therapeutics
Kathy Surace-Smith JD 1984 Senior Vice President at NanoString Technologies
Fermi Wang MS 1989, PhD 1991 CEO and co-founder of Ambarella Inc.
Shirley Wang MBA 1993 founder and CEO of Plastpro Inc
Alisa Amarosa Wood BA 2001, MBA 2008 Co-Chief Executive Officer of KKR Private Equity Conglomerate LLC

Notable past trustees

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The following people have served as trustees in the past:[24]

Name Columbia Degree(s) Occupation
Rolando Acosta BA 1979, JD 1982 presiding justice of the Appellate Division of the New York Supreme Court, First Judicial Department
A'Lelia Bundles MS 1976 journalist, news producer, author
José A. Cabranes BA 1961[25] judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, former Presiding Judge of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review
William Campbell BA 1962, MEd 1964[26] founder of Claris, former chairman and CEO of Intuit and director of Apple Inc.
Jerome Chazen MBA 1950[27] founder of Liz Claiborne, Inc
Thomas Ludlow Chrystie II BA 1955 former CFO of Merrill Lynch & Company
Patricia Cloherty MS 1970[28] chairman and CEO of Delta Private Equity Partners
Edward N. Costikyan BA 1947, LLB 1949 partner of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and political adviser
John Curley MS 1963[29] professor at Pennsylvania State University, former editor of USA Today and chairman of Gannett
Evan A. Davis JD 1969 partner of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, former president of the New York City Bar Association
Marcellus Hartley Dodge Sr.[30] BA 1903 former chairman of the Remington Arms Company
Stephen Friedman JD 1962[31] chairman of Stone Point Capital, former director of the United States National Economic Council and chairman of Goldman Sachs
Noam Gottesman BA 1986 CEO of TOMS Capital and founder of GLG Partners
Joseph A. Greenaway Jr. BA 1978 Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
Samuel L. Higginbottom BS 1943 former chairman, CEO, president of Rolls-Royce North America, former CEO and president of Eastern Air Lines
Ben Horowitz BA 1988[32] co-founder and general partner of Andreessen Horowitz
Ellen Kaden JD 1977[33] former chief legal officer of CBS, Inc and Campbell Soup Company
Mark E. Kingdon BA 1971[34] hedge fund manager and president of Kingdon Capital Management
Robert Kraft BA 1963 chairman and CEO of The Kraft Group
Jonathan Lavine (Co-chair) BA 1988 co-managing partner of Bain Capital
Gerry Lenfest LLB 1958 lawyer, philanthropist
Li Lu BA 1996, JD 1996, MBA 1996 founder and chairman of Himalaya Capital Management
Anna Kazanjian Longobardo BS 1949, MS 1952[35] former executive of Unisys and co-founder of Society of Women Engineers
Donald McHenry none professor at Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, former United States Ambassador to the United Nations[36]
Charles Li JD 1991[37] former CEO of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing
Julie Menin BA 1989 former chair of Manhattan Community Board 1, commissioner of New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection
Charles Miller Metzner BA 1931, LLB 1933 former judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
Gertrude Michelson LLB 1947[38] vice president of Macy's, deputy chair of Federal Reserve Bank, director of many corporations
Philip L. Milstein BA 1971[39] principal of Ogden CAP Properties and former chairman of Emigrant Bank
Yuzaburo Mogi MBA 1961[40] chairman and CEO of Kikkoman
Vikram Pandit BS 1976, MS 1977, MPhil 1980, PhD 1986[41] chairman of The Orogen Group and former CEO of Citigroup[42]
Julissa Reynoso Pantaleón JD 2001 chief of staff to First Lady Jill Biden, former United States Ambassador to Uruguay and nominee for United States Ambassador to Spain
Lionel Pincus MBA 1956 founder of Warburg Pincus
Edmund Prentis BS 1906[43] founder of Spencer, White & Prentis, president of the American Standards Association
Warren H. Phillips none former CEO of Dow Jones & Company
Arnold S. Relman MD 1946[44] former editor of The New England Journal of Medicine
George Erik Rupp none former President of Columbia University, Rice University, and the International Rescue Committee
Jonathan Schiller BA 1969, JD 1973[45] co-founder of Boies Schiller Flexner LLP
Michael I. Sovern BA 1953, LLB 1955 former President of Columbia University, chairman of Sotheby's, American Academy in Rome, and Japan Society
Jerry Speyer BA 1962, MBA 1964[46] founder and chairman of Tishman Speyer
Joan E. Spero MIA 1968[47] former Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment
David Stern JD 1966 former Commissioner of the NBA
Arthur Hays Sulzberger[30] BA 1913 former publisher of The New York Times
Punch Sulzberger BA 1951 former publisher of The New York Times and chairman of The New York Times Company and Metropolitan Museum of Art
Lawrence Walsh BA 1931, LLB 1935 former United States Deputy Attorney General and judge on the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, independent counsel on the Iran–Contra affair investigations
Faye Wattleton MSN 1967[48] former president of Planned Parenthood
Felix Wormser[30] BS 1916 former Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Mineral Resources
Sheena Wright BA 1990, JD 1994 deputy mayor of New York City[49]
John Eugene Zuccotti none real estate developer and former U.S. chairman of Brookfield Properties

References

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  1. ^ Roberts, Andrea Suozzo, Alec Glassford, Ash Ngu, Brandon (2013-05-09). "Columbia University In The City Of New York, Full Filing - Nonprofit Explorer". ProPublica. Retrieved 2024-05-03.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ a b "Organization and Governance of the University". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  3. ^ Daniels, Lee A. (June 21, 1989). "Columbia Trustee Head: A Low-Key Trailblazer". Education. The New York Times. p. B7.
  4. ^ a b "Who Owns Columbia? The University Trustees, Of Course". Columbia Daily Spectator. March 27, 2013.
  5. ^ "The Trustees of Columbia University | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  6. ^ Bates, J. Douglas (1991). The Pulitzer Prize: The Inside Story of America's Most Prestigious Award. Carol Publishing Group. p. 115. ISBN 9781559720700.
  7. ^ a b c McCaughey, Robert (2003). Stand, Columbia A History of Columbia University. Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-13008-0. OCLC 1020285655.
  8. ^ Officers and Graduates of Columbia College: Originally the College of the Province of New York Known as King's College. General Catalogue, 1754-1894. New York. 1894. p. 11.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  9. ^ a b McCaughey (2003), p. 23.
  10. ^ McCaughey (2003), p. 40.
  11. ^ McCaughey (2003), p. 25.
  12. ^ McCaughey (2003), p. 45.
  13. ^ "Charters and Statutes" (PDF). 2020. Retrieved May 21, 2021.
  14. ^ Gruber, Carol Signer (September 1972). "Academic freedom at Columbia University, 1917-1918: The Case of James McKeen Cattell". AAUP Bulletin. 58 (3): 297–305. doi:10.2307/40224603. JSTOR 40224603.
  15. ^ Sokal, Michael M. (2009). "James McKeen Cattell, Nicholas Murray Butler, and academic freedom at Columbia University, 1902–1923". History of Psychology. 12 (2): 87–122. doi:10.1037/a0016143.
  16. ^ Oehlschlaeger, Fritz H. (November 1979). "Hamlin Garland and the Pulitzer Prize controversy of 1921". American Literature. 51 (3): 409–414. doi:10.2307/2925396. JSTOR 2925396.
  17. ^ "Hail to the Loser". The Press. Time. May 18, 1962.
  18. ^ Kihss, Peter (May 8, 1962). "Columbia Trustees Block Pulitzer Prize for 'Hearst'; Speculation on Motive". The New York Times.
  19. ^ Bradley, Stefan M. (2010). Harlem vs. Columbia University: Black Student Power in the Late 1960s. University of Illinois Press. p. 98. ISBN 9780252090585.
  20. ^ Brownstein, Andrew (July 6, 2001). "A Battle of Wills, Rights, and P.R. at Columbia: University rethinks judicial code after civil-liberties group uses 'guerrilla warfare' to attack it". Inside Higher Education.
  21. ^ Kiley, Kevin (April 3, 2012). "A Core Question: A trustee's critical column in Columbia's student paper challenges the notion that private university trustees should speak with a unified voice". Inside Higher Education.
  22. ^ Sforza, Lauren (2024-04-29). "Democrats call on Columbia board to end protest encampment or resign". The Hill. Retrieved 2024-05-03.
  23. ^ "The Trustees of Columbia University".
  24. ^ "The Trustees Emeriti | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  25. ^ "José A. Cabranes | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  26. ^ Palladino, Lisa (Summer 2016). "William V. Campbell '62, TC'64, Former Trustees Chair, Lions Coach, Silicon Valley Adviser". Columbia College Today. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
  27. ^ School, Columbia Business (2013-08-02). "Jerome A. Chazen '50". The Jerome A. Chazen Institute for Global Business. Retrieved 2020-11-17. {{cite web}}: |first= has generic name (help)
  28. ^ "Cloherty Named Trustee at Teachers College". www.columbia.akadns.net. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  29. ^ "4 Alumni Given Journalism's Highest Honors". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  30. ^ a b c "Columbia Daily Spectator 13 February 1957 — Columbia Spectator". spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2021-07-14.
  31. ^ "Stephen Friedman Elected Chair of Columbia Trustees". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  32. ^ "Benjamin Horowitz | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  33. ^ "Press Release: New Trustees Named". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  34. ^ "Mark E. Kingdon | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  35. ^ "Anna Kazanjian Longobardo". Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics. 2017-06-27. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  36. ^ "Amb. Donald F. McHenry". ISD. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  37. ^ "Charles Li '91 Returns to Columbia Law School to Discuss World Economic Prospects". www.law.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2022-01-28.
  38. ^ Duhigg, Charles (2015-01-14). "G.G. Michelson, Macy's Executive Who Broke Glass Ceilings, Dies at 89". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on January 14, 2015. Retrieved 2021-05-16.
  39. ^ "Philip Milstein Elected Trustee of Columbia University". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  40. ^ "Trustees Elect Japan Business Executive, Alum". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  41. ^ "Vikram Pandit | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  42. ^ Inc, ExlService Holdings (2018-10-02). "EXL Announces $150 Million Strategic Investment from The Orogen Group". GlobeNewswire News Room (Press release). Retrieved 2020-11-17. {{cite press release}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  43. ^ Butler, Nicholas Murray (October 3, 1940). "Columbia University in this World Crisis" (PDF). Retrieved October 2, 2021.
  44. ^ "Arnold Relman, Former NEJM Editor and P&S Grad, Dies". Columbia University Irving Medical Center. 2014-06-18. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  45. ^ "Jonathan D. Schiller | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  46. ^ "Press Release: Jerry I. Speyer, Lionel Pincus to Share Chairmanship of Trustees of Columbia University for Next Two Years". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  47. ^ "Joan Spero | Columbia SIPA". www.sipa.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  48. ^ "Faye Wattleton | Office of the Secretary of the University". secretary.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-17.
  49. ^ "United Way of New York City President & CEO Sheena Wright to Serve as Deputy Mayor for Strategic Initiatives in Incoming Adams Administration". United Way of New York City. 2021-12-20. Retrieved 2022-01-12.
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40°48′30″N 73°57′43″W / 40.80826°N 73.96188°W / 40.80826; -73.96188

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