Lasell College to Inaugurate Michael B. Alexander as Ninth President

NEWTON, MA -- Michael B. Alexander will be inaugurated as the ninth President of Lasell College on Friday, April 4th, 2008 at 2 p.m. at the Lasell Athletic Center.

The installation ceremony of President Alexander will be part of a three-day series of events designed around the theme “Embracing Diversity” that includes a tribute to Japanese culture and a performance of the Japanese Tea Ceremony to honor Lasell’s longstanding relationship with the Yamawaki Gakuen Junior College in Tokyo, as well as an Academic Colloquium celebrating the student immigrant experience, a reflection on Rev. Martin Luther King on the 40th anniversary of his death, and an international perspectives panel with students reporting their service-learning experiences in Mexico through Lasell’s “Shoulder to Shoulder” program.

The inauguration of Michael Alexander, a former corporate leader who has extensive experience in the fields of entertainment and technology, who brings a fresh and nontraditional approach to academic governance, will feature all the customs and regalia befitting one of the most solemn and celebratory of academic ceremonies.

During a colorful procession by robed representatives from local, regional and national academic institutions, the installation will include, for the first time in Lasell’s history, the introduction of the Lasell ceremonial mace and presidential chain of office medallion, a gift to the College by Inauguration Planning Committee Chair and Trustee Adelaide Schaffer Van Winkle ‘’36/H ’96, in honor of the event.

Founded in 1851, Lasell College is one of the oldest institutions of higher learning in the Boston area. A comprehensive coeducational college offering professionally oriented bachelor's and master's degree programs, Lasell provides students with some 25 academic majors in a distinctive “Connected Learning” curriculum in which students are directly and actively engaged in the fields they are learning.