Board of Trustees incorporates new perspectives

Brandon Bell
News Editor

Three women were appointed to the College’s Board of Trustees at the governing body’s meeting in late October.

Mary Gearen ’79, Jilliene Johnson ’08 and Meret Nahas ’10 were all voted in by the existing membership of the Board, which has now increased to 43 members — 17 of whom are women.

Johnson and Nahas were both elected as the Board’s first Graduates of the Last Decade (G.O.L.D.) trustees, positions created in an attempt to make the Board more representative of younger alumni. They will be able to serve one three-year term in their current position. Gearen, meanwhile, was nominated and elected as an Alumni Member, and will serve as one of six such members for a three-year term.

All three have previous experience as members of college administration. Nahas previously worked in Wooster’s Office of Development and Alumni Engagement and currently works as associate director of development at the Loomis Chaffee School, a secondary boarding school in Connecticut. Gearen was previously a member of the Board of Trustees at the University of Saint Thomas in Minnesota, while Johnson is currently director of diversity, engagement and professional development in the Dean of Students Office at the University of Vermont.

Noting their past experience, President Sarah Bolton said that she was looking forward to working with them.

“They bring exceptional experience to the Board, and they have already been important in our conversations at this first [October] board meeting,” Bolton said.

In addition to their professional backgrounds, Bolton also said that their membership would improve the representation of underrepresented groups. In addition to the inclusion of three new female members, Johnson and Nahas are both people of color.

“The Board has been intentional about increasing the diversity of perspectives it includes,” Bolton said. “The wider the variety of experiences and identities coming to the table in conversations, the better the quality of work produced.”

She extended these same thoughts to the fact that Johnson and Nahas are G.O.L.D. trustees, arguing that the inclusion of recent graduates onto the Board would benefit current students as well.

“While the Board already meets directly with students, recent graduates provide a different, and important, perspective,” Bolton said. “They have been at the College recently enough to share many experiences with current students. But, having been in the working world for several years after graduation, they also have a perspective on the ways their Wooster education prepared them for their lives and work.”

Bolton also said that Johnson and Nahas could provide students with career networking opportunities during times when trustees are on campus, given their unique position as recent graduates.

When asked about the two new G.O.L.D. trustees in particular, members of the Student Government Association (SGA) were optimistic that they would be receptive to student input.

“I think that all the students were shocked and amazed when both Meret Nahas and Jilliene Johnson introduced themselves and shared their class year at the Student Development meeting,” Maggie Sestito ’18, SGA’s president, said, referencing a meeting held in late October between trustees and student representatives. “Student life changes rather quickly, but their more recent experiences at Wooster, and the work they do now, can help reframe and bring greater understanding to the conversations surrounding student life at Wooster.”

Rie Matsuzaki ’19, who works on student advocacy and public relations for SGA, agreed, but said that she believed students would have to become more engaged with trustees to take advantage of the G.O.L.D. trustees’ perspective.

“As long as the students are not engaged [with] the trustees, improving or expanding their members would not play an effective role as [the students] still won’t know,” Matsuzaki said. “I hope the [G.O.L.D. trustees] can be a bridge between students and trustees so that all trustees can feel like they are solving some young people’s issues, but also solving issues for themselves too.”