Not Your Father’s College President

We are sending warm and healing thoughts to Kent Syverud.

The writer is a current president.

I was catching up on College Matters, the podcast from The Chronicle of Higher Education, the other day. It was the episode about the Ted Carter scandal at Ohio State and the proclivity of male university presidents to believe that they are particularly interesting, even sexually interesting, because they hold power and people are always fawning over them.

I became concerned not so much about another alpha male college president ruining his career and scandalizing his university, but rather how The Chronicle, in the course of the podcast discussion, characterized the role of the president and spouse:

“The sort of typical picture is a president with their spouse, usually, honestly, it’s a man and their wife and they are kind of like the president and the first lady of the U.S. It’s like a similar kind of role, often not paid, but it’s significant on campus.”

Throughout the 40-minute discussion, there were similar references and assumptions without even a nod to the approximately one-third of college and university presidents these days who are women. The situation at Ohio State was portrayed as normal as it might have been 40 years ago, when the American Council on Education published its first American College President Study and the percentage of female presidents was under 10 percent.

The Chronicle podcast was followed a few weeks later by a Chronicle article, “The Art of Being a Presidential Spouse,” by David Jesse, that dissected the role of the spouse—with a complete focus on male presidents and nary a mention of the other third.

Perhaps we should ask how that other third, those statistically at less risk of losing their job and embarrassing their university over an extramarital affair, are handling the spousal aspect of their presidencies.

Some of us are married to someone who is deeply engaged in their own career, because not all men, or women, believe that the privilege of being married to a college president is a reason to give up a successful career. Others of us have spouses who are older, perhaps retired, and they may not have the energy or desire to show up all the time as the quiet, charming part of a dynamic duo in support of the university.

How are these women presidents able to conduct the presidency without ample free labor from their spouse, while at the same time often continuing to do or be involved in the cooking, laundry, and/or significant time it takes to keep up with family—tasks I doubt Admiral Carter was doing as president of Ohio State? And then there are those women who do not have a partner, so don’t have the option of showing up with someone in the “first lady” role.

We women tend to stay out of trouble because without consistent, free help, this job is so exhausting there is no time for power-infused extramarital dalliances. There usually isn’t even time to exercise, read a book, or enjoy the company of a spouse.

Is the made-for-alumni-and-donors picture of a marital team that echoes the U.S. presidency really that important? Or does it mask the reality of female presidents who don’t have this luxury and could use some help, while at the same time building up an expectation about the character of the typical male president that sometimes turns out to be wrong and makes his indiscretions all the more disastrous when they occur? 

Maybe it’s time for a new paradigm.