NORTHAMPTON — Smith College has named a new provost and dean of faculty.
The college announced earlier this week that Michael Thurston, an English and literature professor who has held several faculty governance positions at the college, would take over the role beginning July 1. Thurston will take the reins from Joe O’Rourke, who has held the role in interim since Katherine Rowe, who was in the position from 2014 until she became president of the College of William and Mary earlier this year.
“It’s really exciting; it’s a little terrifying,” Thurston said in an interview Friday. “It’s a big responsibility, and I think it’s a job that’s both big and important, and it’s a shift of gears for me.”
Thurston said he’s used to working on projects such as articles and books — he has been writing a book about Cape Cod, following the footsteps of Henry David Thoreau — but now his big project will be the college itself. He said he feels ready for the job, but he’s aware that it comes with a steep learning curve.
“Fortunately, my readiness is not the only readiness that matters,” Thurston said. “And I feel institutionally very well-supported.”
A member of the college’s faculty since 2000, Thurston has previously served as a chair of the Faculty Council, and he is currently on Smith’s Committee on Tenure and Promotion. He also chairs the English department, and in 2010 he received the college’s Sherrerd Prize for Distinguished Teaching. Thurston earned his undergraduate degree at the University of North Texas and his graduate degrees from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
“A model scholar with a deep commitment to inclusivity, Michael Thurston impressed me and the search committee as a deep and creative thinker about the future of the liberal arts,” Smith President Kathleen McCartney said in a statement. “I look forward to partnering with him in this work and in many important initiatives — such as the renovation of Neilson Library, the improvement of our teaching spaces, curricular innovations and the renewal of the faculty — that are critical to the academic distinction of Smith College.”
Thurston succeeds another Smith professor originally from the English and literature department. Katherine Anandi Rowe had been provost and dean of faculty from 2014 until February of this year, when she was named as the first woman president ever in the 325-year history of the College of William and Mary.
“The things I’m looking forward to are really being an advocate and cheerleader for a vision of liberal education which I think is really important,” Thurston said. “Liberal education is exploring something you’re passionate about, and through that … developing what I see as very fundamental capacities.”
Thurston’s tenure will also come halfway through a $100 million redesign of the Neilson Library, as McCartney alluded to in her statement.
“Libraries are absolutely central to liberal education, to higher education,” Thurston said. “We’re people who read, and we’re people who circulate knowledge.”
Dusty Christensen can be reached at dchristensen@gazettenet.com.