By Gabrielle Fimbres

(Photo: Balfour/Walker.com)

Ann Weaver Hart scoots across the University of Arizona campus in a golf cart, caught up in a wave of students hustling to their next class.

As she makes her way to an appointment at the College of Science, this newly inaugurated 21st president of the university stops to greet faculty, and chats with students in a crowded elevator.

Hart is in her element, overseeing this top research university of 40,000 stu­dents and more than 12,000 employees. Her challenge is to help the university grow and thrive in a rapidly evolving world – with dwindling state resources, technology that moves at the speed of light and tough competition.

“It’s a very exciting time to really have an impact,” said Hart, 64. “The world around us has shifted in a way that presents tremendous opportunity for great universities to be more embedded in all activities in our lives.”

Among her top challenges – strengthening biomedical programs, growing partnerships with industry, improving graduation rates and building a health sciences leadership team that will set national standards in academic medi­cine.

Hart, who served as president of Temple University for six years and presi­dent of the University of New Hampshire prior to that, was drawn to UA’s strengths and its challenges.

“The University of Arizona is widely known as one of the top centers of the physical, optical and space sciences in the world,” she said. “We are also widely known for tremendous arts and humanities programs.

“I had previously come to appreciate and enjoy the central role of land-grant universities because of my experience in New Hampshire. With that and medical science, the UA offered the best of all worlds in research public higher education.”

After her appointment, folks from the UA library presented Hart with a gift – a framed collection of the school’s presidents throughout history, dating back to the 1880s. A portrait of Hart in a stunning red suit sits atop black-and-white photos of her 20 predecessors, making a striking contrast.

Hart serves as the first woman president in the school’s 127-year history – a fact that, while significant, does not define her.

“I have been the first woman in many of the positions I have held,” Hart said. “I’m thrilled and excited for other women. I am the mother of four daughters, so obviously I have a stake in the future, but it isn’t a defining part of my character.”

Having survived her first desert summer after arriving in July, Hart said she and Randy Hart, her husband of 44 years and a retired attorney, are already dug in.

“What a drop-dead gorgeous monsoon we had,” Hart said. “We live near the Santa Catalina Mountains, and the storms and the sunshine and the sun­sets and the moon – we feel like we’ve come home.”

In her nearly six months on the job, Hart has become embedded in local organizations, including the Arizona State Board of Education, Campus Research Corporation, Southern Arizona Leadership Council, Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities, UA Alumni Association, UA Foundation and the Udall Foundation.

She understands the critical role the university plays in boosting economic development through the spin-off of new companies and partnerships with industry.

Among Hart’s first presidential tasks is the selection of three key health sci­ences leadership positions – the CEO for the nonprofit University of Arizona Health Network – Dr. Michael R. Wal­drum from the University of Alabama will assume this post in January – plus a new director for Arizona Cancer Cen­ter and a senior VP for health sciences.

“Those three people are going to be leaders in one of the most impor­tant disciplines at the university and in America,” Hart said. “The structure is new. The board is new, with tremen­dous opportunities during a period of real uncertainty and change with the national and state healthcare environ­ment.

“It is our biggest opportunity and our greatest peril,” she added. “The finan­cial, social and cultural risks are huge.”

Boosting biomedical research at UA is among her top goals. “We are among the leaders in the world in the physical and life sciences, other than biomedi­cal. We are about average in the United States in our research in medical. We have a tremendous opportunity here.”

She is enthusiastic about the recent appointment of David Allen as found­ing executive director of Tech Launch Arizona, a technology commercializa­tion center aimed at moving knowledge and inventions developed at the UA to market.

“The future for great universities like the University of Arizona is going to be increasingly interdependent with the application of the knowledge that is generated here to human existence and life,” she said. “Being able to take those new discoveries and turn them into something that is actually applied to the way we live is critical.”

Jack B. Jewett, president and CEO of the Flinn Foundation, said Hart has “demonstrated a keen sense of under­standing and recognition of the impor­tance of what Arizona is striving to ac­complish in the biosciences.

“During her first weeks in office, she eagerly accepted the Flinn Foundation’s invitation to speak to a group of 100 statewide bioscience leaders, and was spot-on in her comments about the role of UA and the importance of Arizona’s bioscience ambitions from both re­search and commercialization perspec­tives,” he said.

Ron Shoopman, president of SALC, said Hart outlined for members of that organization how she and the univer­sity can partner with business leaders to create prosperity for the region.

“The University of Arizona is a criti­cal and significant driver of economic development in our region,” Shoopman said. “Tech Launch Arizona promises to be a powerful new economic devel­opment tool. SALC members were ex­tremely impressed with the vision and commitment of President Hart in cre­ating prosperity for Tucson and South­ern Arizona.”

Growing connections between the university and industry is critical, Hart said. “So many great businesses in Southern Arizona are related to aca­demic strength at the university – Ray­theon, Honeywell, Boeing. Ventana Medical Systems grew from the knowl­edge that was developed here at the UA,” she noted.

“All of those activities give us an op­portunity to learn by doing – but to also have research partnerships and eco­nomic development. It’s really a two-way street. We create knowledge. They use it. It is a partnership that is very im­portant to us.”

Mara Aspinall, president of Ven­tana Medical, predicts Hart will build a stronger higher education system, which will build a stronger economy.

“With Dr. Hart’s track record of suc­cessful leadership in higher educational institutions and her interest in promot­ing STEM education at the primary and secondary levels, she is the ideal leader to help the UA realize its vision of partnership with Arizona’s growing biotech industry,” Aspinall said.

Taylor Lawrence, president of Raytheon Missile Systems, said Hart “brings strong knowledge of what it takes to run a large, complex research university.

“We’ve enjoyed many years of col­laboration and partnership with the UA – and we expect that relationship to expand and grow under Dr. Hart’s leadership,” Lawrence said.

The UA is also charged with improv­ing K-12 education. “Our College of Education has tremendous teacher education and research and leadership programs,” Hart said. “We bring the superintendents of Southern Arizona school districts together with us at UA to share ways in which we can work to­gether better.

Ronald Marx, dean of the College of Education, said Hart “brings wisdom and experience to her new role as presi­dent of UA.

“She has learned that great universi­ties are more successful when they part­ner closely with government, nonprofit and corporate sectors,” Marx said. “She knows that all great cities have great universities, and that higher education contributes to economic, cultural and civic vitality. She is a terrific leader and a great educator – and for a bonus for us in the College of Education, she is a professor in one of our departments.”

Hart’s roots in education run deep. She grew up in Salt Lake City “long enough ago that it wasn’t the expecta­tion necessarily that women would go to college, let alone have a career,” she said.

“My parents always made it very clear that regardless of what I did with my life I was expected to be an educat­ed person.”

Her mother was a dietician and a full-time homemaker who later became an elementary teacher. Her dad was a physicist who abandoned that career to join the family fur business.

Did Hart dream of one day being a university president? “Oh my goodness no. When I was a young woman I was expected to be, and thought I would be, a full-time homemaker. Teach­ing was the job my mother told me I should pursue so that if anything ever happened to my husband I would have something to fall back on.”

She started teaching right out of col­lege, and after her fourth daughter was born, she pursued graduate school. Hart received a master’s degree in his­tory and a doctorate in educational leadership.

She quickly rose up the ranks, from teacher to junior high principal to uni­versity professor. “The presidencies just sort of evolved out of opportunities and discussions with mentors who seemed to think it was something I should con­sider,” Hart said.

Hart is focused on strengthening UA’s position as a top research uni­versity while growing the institution, in part through distance learning. “As Southern Arizona grows, we need to in­crease our capacity to provide access to a world-class education.”

She embraces UA’s mission. “As a land-grant university, UA will have a lasting and statewide impact on economic and cultural development.”

Shane Burgess, dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, said Hart “brings a true interest in ensuring that we are the most relevant we can be for the 21st century.

“She has a strong understanding of the inherent and fundamental value of the land-grant universities to the Unit­ed States’ continued economic success and national security,” he said.

Athletic Director Greg Byrne said Hart “has already brought tremendous energy to the university as she devel­ops her overall vision for the university during her tenure and beyond. She has been very supportive of athletics. We are often the front porch for the univer­sity for a lot of folks.”

Rick Myers, a member of the Arizo­na Board of Regents who helped lead the presidential search committee, said Hart has a strong record of transform­ing universities.

“We have so many challenges – but at the same time we have so many oppor­tunities,” Myers said. “Not only is Ann good at creating a roadmap, she is very good at making decisions to start exe­cuting that roadmap and getting people engaged and moving forward.

“Ann is exactly the right person at the right time to help the University of Ari­zona create the future that we deserve,” Myers said.

Anatomy of a Presidential Search

By Gabrielle Fimbres

Selecting a new president for a major public research university is no simple task.

So Rick Myers, an Arizona regent who co-chaired the committee to select the new University of Arizona president, turned to the experts for advice.

“I talked to a number of the senior university presidents around the country – Stanford, the University of Michigan, Virginia,” said Myers, who headed up the committee with former U.S. Sen. Den­nis DeConcini.

“I asked them what we should be look­ing for as we bring a new leader into this organization – and every one of them said UA is a jewel that is truly one of the nation’s important public research universities,” Myers said.

“But they also said that being able to manage change is absolutely the num­ber one attribute that you want to find in the next leader,” he continued. “You want somebody to come in who will shape and evolve the organization to be great in the future.”

The committee reviewed applica­tions from hundreds of candidates from around the world over six months.

Hart emerged as a leading candidate. “The fact that Ann had been a university president twice before was very posi­tive. She had demonstrated success at both the University of New Hampshire and at Temple in terms of creating real change.”

The committee wanted hard data. They examined goals the Arizona Re­gents had set – increased graduation rates, access to more students, growth in research. “We took those metrics and we looked at a number of the candidates – where their institutions were when they started that job and where those mea­surements were at the end.

“The thing that really impressed us about Dr. Hart more than anyone else is that she showed real change,” My­ers said. “The numbers moved. The ball went down the field. It showed us that this is someone that doesn’t just have great ideas – but someone that has actually created real, positive change. We knew she would be ready to hit the ground running and start making a dif­ference on day one.”