Monday, August 11, 2003

By Bill Schackner, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Even on a liberal arts campus where faculty are known more for teaching than research, you're likely to find scholars who are intent on testing out theories or publishing groundbreaking papers.

Name: Richard G. Jewell Date of birth: April 19, 1945 Place of birth: Flushing, N.Y. In the news: Named last week as president of Grove City College. Quote: "Knowing Grove City as I do, first of all, the most important thing I will be doing is continuing along the path that is well trod at that school -- that of teaching." Education: He graduated cum laude in 1967 from Grove City, achieving high honors in political science, then got his law degree in 1973 from the University of Michigan Law School. Family: Jewell, and wife, Dayl, a retired PNC Bank vice president, have an adult daughter, Jessica.

That fact isn't lost on Richard G. Jewell, a Pittsburgh lawyer and businessman named last week as president of one such campus, Grove City College.

Faculty there have talked about developing an institute or center that would deal with public policy issues, and Jewell will be exploring whether such an idea is feasible after he takes office early next month.

Such a center would probably apply the school's conservative Christian values to its studies of such issues as the environment, separation of church and state, and tax and fiscal policy, campus administrators said.

Jewell, 58, who's taught constitutional law and constitutional history as an adjunct faculty member on the Grove City campus, has never held a permanent faculty post. But he's no stranger to academia either -- in particular, the research end, thanks to previous work including a stint as a senior administrator in applied research at the University of Pittsburgh.

The center idea at Grove City is in its early stages, college officials say, and there are questions to be answered before it can be taken to the board of trustees. Among them is where the money would come from to support it.

Nevertheless, opening a center or institute could further raise the Mercer County college's profile while providing a channel for faculty interests, primarily in the social sciences, Jewell said. Research and commentary, he said, are not incompatible with Grove City's ideals.

"It's another form of teaching, not only to students but to the public at large and to the policy-makers," he said.

He added that the center would allow faculty to "give their opinions to a broader audience and to engage in an intellectual debate outside of the classroom."

Jewell also will be kept busy by the college's $60 million fund-raising campaign, along with its first strategic planning initiative to aid future program decisions and construction on the 2,300-student campus.

Jewell is a native of Flushing, N.Y. He got his law degree from the University of Michigan, and currently works in Pittsburgh as a director of the Chicago-based Navigant Consulting Inc., a forensic accounting firm.

He received a bachelor's degree from Grove City in 1967, and has remained active as an alumnus and served on Grove City's board of trustees.

The Bethel Park resident has been active in politics and civic affairs.

"To be honest with you, [the presidency] feels like a logical extension of all my interests in life -- my training as a lawyer, my training in business, my teaching," he said.

Much has changed at Grove City since he earned high honors studying political science in the mid-1960s, even though a few faculty members from those days are still there.

"At the risk of offending some of my classmates from the '60s, I would say that the student body in terms of SATs and class rank is considerably stronger," he said.

And there's been a change in the faculty itself.

About 40 percent held doctoral degrees in the 1960s, Jewell said, but now the share has grown to about 80 percent.

More are writing books, doing research and -- in the case of some recent hires -- arrive at Grove City having already worked in places like the University of Michigan and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

"They naturally are more interested in doing some things that have a broader audience," said John A. Sparks, dean of the School of Arts and Letters and a business professor who has taught at Grove City for 27 years.

In the area of public policy, Grove City has taken some attention-getting stands over the years. The campus, which has conservative Christian roots, has refused, for instance, to accept government aid -- something the college says frees it from burdensome regulation.

Sparks said the college would apply its long-established values to any public policy issue.

He described those values as "freedom of markets, private property rights, limited constitutional government and Christian values shaping the moral order. When we got into any particular public policy issues, I would expect the solutions would be consistent with those sorts of values."

Jewell said the center would not in any way diminish the college's primary focus on classroom instruction.

Is there a downside to opening the center?

"You'd get people that don't agree with you, which is what it's all about, isn't it?" said Jewell. "It's the marketplace of ideas."

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