GODDARD PRESIDENT LOOKS BACK WITH SATISFACTION

by David W. Smith - Times Argus Staff

PLAINFIELD - When Barbara Mossberg accepted the role of leader at Goddard College in the early fall of 1997, she heard whispers around campus predicting her stint as president could end in a period measured in months.

A school with an aggressively experimental philosophy of education, the Goddard community has a reputation of being pretty hard on anyone who assumes the title of president. Before Mossberg, who announced last weekend that she would be leaving the Plainfield college in six months, the school had run through five presidents in a decade. The most recent was Richard Greene, who resigned in 1996.

Despite outcries from students and faculty about her policies over the years, Mossberg has remained confident in the direction she felt Goddard should take, and never believed the rumors that the job ahead would be as hard as she was told.

"It seemed very ambitious to prove, not only that you could survive at Goddard, but thrive," Mossberg said in an interview this week.

How successful she was depends upon whom you ask. Goddard trustees have credited Mossberg with a complete financial and spiritual rebirth of the 650-student college, and bestowed the title of president-emeritus as a gesture of good-will and a continuing relationship.

Following the news of her coming resignation, however, someone tacked a copy of her three-page departure announcement, e-mailed to all school community members Sunday night, to the bulletin board of the student center. A simple printed sign was placed above: "Glory Glory Alleluia."

Mossberg came to Goddard from the National University of San Diego, where she served as interim dean. She will leave at the end of July.

She said this week she had never taken criticism of her work and policies personally.

The afternoon following her announcement, she bounded about her circular office, still buzzing with excitement about the school and her accomplishments over the years. Her decision to leave is for personal reasons, she said, not because the job wasn't going well.

"For me, it's not been an easy decision," said Mossberg, who will be working as a consultant with a division of the American Council on Education in Washington, D.C., where her husband, a lawyer, works.

"We've been commuting for five years and our daughter is 10 years old," said Mossberg, who took the Goddard presidency intending to stay three years. "I always knew the job, in terms of my family, was not sustainable."

Never shy about articulating her successes, Mossberg said she believes the school is the strongest it has ever been. Goddard has seen fund-raising rise to an all-time high during her tenure, and enrollment and retention of students is the highest it's been in decades.

These indicators show the school is on stable ground, she said, and is ready to move forward without her.

She praised the cooperation of the staff, and the support she has received from the Board of Trustees. Board support, she said, is critical in the success of any college president.

"I was faithful and loyal to the college, but I think the board was faithful of my leadership," she said. "Every way you look you see success in every direction."

Last year the board offered her a five-year contract, the longest awarded any of Goddard's eight presidents.

Mossberg noted other changes undertaken in the past 3 1/2 years. The college is fully staffed for the first time in decades. Finances are stable, and Goddard has no long-term debt. A student loan endowment was established, and relationships were forged with Vermont Technical College and Southern Vermont College, as well as institutions outside the state. A three-year labor contract with a newly unionized staff was concluded efficiently, she said. Many of the schools older buildings are also being restored.

But not all has gone well. Students have publicly criticized Mossberg for being out of touch with the needs of progressive education. She has been accused of ignoring the school's community governance philosophy, and students have called for a dissolution of the office of president.

In 1999, faculty members involved in an attempt to unionize submitted a vote of no confidence in Mossberg and trustees Chairman Paul Blanc.

The most frustrating thing she encountered, Mossberg said, was getting people to accept that indicators of improvement were real. The tension between administration and the rest of the school community, she said, never bothered her. In her research, she saw similar arguments between factions at Goddard through the college's history.

"I did not think that the challenge was unique to Goddard. I thought that at Goddard it was more visible," said Mossberg, adding that her interactions with others were always respectful. "I did not take the issues personally."

In the next six months, she plans to continue stabilizing the school's infrastructure to prepare for an orderly leadership transfer. Mossberg recommended that Interim Provost Stephen Fritz serve as president while a committee chooses her successor, a proposal which trustees approved. She plans to be involved in the search process.

Above all, she plans to act on a recent trustee resolution that Goddard explore ways to integrate with Vermont College and Norwich University, ensuring that an educational presence remains in Montpelier now that Vermont College is up for sale. It's a situation she likens to the aid that Norwich gave to Goddard during a difficult period in the early 1980s.

"We have the same DNA. We're the same family," Mossberg said. "I think this would be a very positive thing for central Vermont."