Dr. Walter Massey:President, Morehouse College
By Gillian Granoff
Diversity begins at home, according to Dr. Walter Massey, the
President of Morehouse College, an all-male, historically black
college, with prestigious graduates such as Martin Luther
King.
For a former physicist, being at the helm is not an exact science.
Dr. Massey defines leadership as having a vision and
a goal and
the strength and conviction to be able to share them with others.
This includes having the commitment
and fortitude do the things
that are required even in difficult circumstances. Dr. Massey
applies this philosophy with a commitment to individualism and
a respect for race. His incredible down to earth and open nature
have made him a natural success at being a leader, witnessed
by his more than twenty honorary doctorates and awards for excellence
in teaching.
Growing up in racially segregated Mississippi, Walter Massey
did not begin his career with aspirations to become a college
president. His proclivity for science led him to a career as
a physicist. Massey achieved success at the University of Chicago
as President of the prestigious Argon Laboratories. The turning
point in his career came when he assumed a faculty position
at the University of Illinois, Urbana. The offer to join the
faculty of University of Illinois in 1968 coincided with the
movement to integrate American Americans into higher education.
An increase in the number of African American students being
admitted to Illinois placed Dr. Massey in the unique position
of serving as a role model and advisor to these new incoming
students. This almost accidental career move motivated his
desire to work with students and planted seeds for a career
in academics. Dr. Massey humbly attributes his success to being
in the right place at the right time.
Dr. Massey went on
to become a professor and later an administrator at Brown
University, a Vice President at the University of Chicago,
and a Provost at the University of California school system.
His decision to accept the presidency of Morehouse, his Alma
Mater, was influenced by Massey’s own desire
to give back to the African American community. At the helm
of Morehouse for nine years,
Dr. Massey has sought to instill in his
students an appreciation for their heritage. He believes connecting them with
their roots will make them stronger and more confident to address the challenges
in a diverse world. “The students leave with
a sense of confidence and pride in
themselves which allows them to go out and
interact with people of all backgrounds because they have a sense of who they
are.” For Dr. Massey, diversity starts with learning to appreciate the
unique nature of individuals, which, Dr. Massey believes, will help his students
to respect racial and gender differences as well. “When you learn to
understand and appreciate differences among individual people, you learn to
deal with racial, gender and other diversity issues.”
Dr. Massey underscores
the diverse student body at Morehouse. “Our
students come from all over the country, from different socio-economic
groups. We have a large international contingent. From the
outside this may look like a homogenous community but these
students are a very varied group.”
Though clearly committed
to the growth of the African American community, Dr. Massey’s
vision is not colored strictly by race. His firm belief in
individualism has influenced his vision for Morehouse. His
goal is to make Morehouse competitive academically with the
most elite universities in the country.
Since arriving at the
university he has come closer to achieving this goal. He
has improved the quality of student and faculty recruitment,
enhanced the college’s fundraising capabilities,
and improved the college’s reputation, by making Morehouse
one of the leading undergraduate institutions in the nation
and the number one African American college.
One of the challenges
Morehouse faces as a small, undergraduate and predominately
African American institution is in the area of financial
resources. Morehouse’s small endowment has
limited its ability to expand. “Being a historically
black college, there are certain traditions that you want to
keep in mind whenever you’re planning for the future.” Massey
discussed the challenge of historically black colleges, many
under mandates to become more diverse, and those like Morehouse
whose goal is to maintain roots in the black community and
to be faithful to the traditions while becoming competitive
with most schools in the country. He hesitates to overstate
the distinctions between historically black colleges and others: “The
audience and traditions are different but overall, the major
things I deal with are about the same.”
Dr Massey’s belief in the importance of tradition has
inspired an atmosphere of cooperation and unity at Morehouse. “We
try and help students appreciate what it means to be an African
American male in society, what the responsibilities and obligations
are. What we find is that our students tend to bond together
more closely. The guys depend on each other a lot more, and
it creates a learning environment in which the students are
much more responsive to helping each other.”
His deep-seated belief
in the value of mentorship has made him appreciate the intimacy
of working at a small undergraduate college. “I have
much more interaction with students than I did at the larger
research institutions. He holds office hours at least twice
a month. His own mentors include Sabinus Cristensen, his
physics teacher whom he credits with helping him to realize
his own strength in the sciences and Howard Swear, the former
President of Brown, who mentored him in his first administration.
And he credits Hannah Gray with helping him to understand
leadership.
His advice to his students is simple: find the things that
you like to do and that will give you a sense of satisfaction
and pride. You, of course, should want to earn a living in
life, but that should not be your primary goal.
Dr. Massey is optimistic about the growth and progress in
the African American community, although he notes that many
inner urban areas still lag behind. The challenge ahead, he
says, is to integrate those communities in the inner city,
who have been unable to benefit from the changes and help them
to take advantage of the opportunities that students at Morehouse
have clearly shared.#
