What is an average day like for the young president of a small liberal arts college?
Well, ask anyone around Troy Hammond, the president of North Central College, and they will ensure that it is indeed a busy day, filled with meetings, planning school renovations, reaching out to alumni and building strong connections with current students across campus.
“He’s drinking from a fire hose,” says Paul Loscheider, vice president for business affairs at North Central.
With all of these obligations, and as a president who has only been a part of the North Central community for just over two years, Hammond has done several things in that short time to work towards the brilliant future that he promised when he first arrived.
“As we move into the future, we’ll continue to prepare brilliant students to become brilliant leaders dedicated to making the world a brilliant place,” writes Hammond in his message to the school. “It will take hard work and sacrifice, but I hope you’ll join me on this remarkable journey. Together, we’ll build on our promising start. Together, we’ll create a more brilliant future.” With this promise that Hammond made just after the start of his time at North Central, he seems to have already helped the school travel to new places along this journey in his short amount of time there.
While some felt that Hammond had big shoes to fill with coming in after former President Hal Wilde, Kimberly Sluis, vice president for student affairs and dean of students, believes that Hammond has done a successful job at filling these shoes in the best way he can.
“Figuring out both how to do the high-level stuff, and be accessible to students, I think, is a tremendous accomplishment for any new president,” Sluis explains.
Though many might not know it, Hammond hosts several different groups of North Central students at his house every week, where they eat and then discuss anything that might be on their minds with the president, while he, in turn, inquires about things that are going on around campus that he might have missed.
As another way to further help this connection with students, as well as the school at large, this technology-loving president has also turned to Twitter, where he can often be seen tweeting about the current events of the day, news on campus, and, of course, his beloved hockey.
Dr. R. Devadoss Pandian, vice president for academic affairs and dean of faculty at North Central, marvels at the memory of Hammond’s first student orientation at the school, where he asked all of the fresh Cardinal faces in attendance to tweet at him. This is certainly not something that is common among most college presidents, and is something that perhaps sets Hammond apart from the rest.
Not only does Hammond strive to connect with current students, but he also wants to maintain strong relationships with Cardinals of the past.
Rick Spencer, vice president for institutional advancement, reminisces about all of travel time, meetings, and late nights spent in hotel bars having a drink with the president as the two work to fundraise and reach out to alumni across the country.
Spencer recalls that when Hammond started at North Central, he set a goal to meet 1,000 alumni within his first three months: a hefty goal that was indeed achieved via webcasts, as well as events on and off campus.
Spencer explains that “right off the bat, he wanted to meet the people; he wanted to get to know the alumni and kind of forge that relationship.”
As a small school of roughly 3,500 students and faculty, Hammond’s efforts to understand and relate to his school seem essential in working toward his brilliant future. In addition to creating these relationships with past and present students, however, Hammond is also working to enhance their learning experiences via extensive renovations and additions to the school.
All throughout the North Central College campus, evidence of the impending changes, renovations and additions to the school can be seen. Along the south side of campus, the sight of orange barrier fences, large yellow machines and mounds of dirt can only mean one thing: construction.
With all of this, President Hammond has certainly had his plate full with planning and orchestrating all of these renovations that are occurring in a domino-effect. In order to build the new science center, a new residence hall must first be built to house all of the students who currently live in the spaces that will be knocked down so that the new science center can be plastered up.
With the buzz of all these changes flying around campus, this period of reconstruction really shows Hammond’s dedication to his school, and is helping him work toward his brilliant future. One especially large project that Hammond was handed from Wilde and has bravely taken on is the state-of-the-art science center, which is set to be unveiled in the Fall of 2017.
Thus, Hammond, who received his Ph.D. in experimental atomic physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and thus has a strong understanding of the sciences, has his hands full with these projects, but is hopeful of their positive impact on the school as a whole.
As a professor of chemistry, Jeffry Bjorklund believes that “the new science center will really transform the way a lot of people see the college,” and that it will change the overall culture on campus.
With a food shop and many places for students to meet, in a location that is much closer to the dorms than any other such spot on campus, Bjorklund anticipates that this new building will benefit everyone on campus, and not just the science students.
With this, President Hammond appears to be creating his brilliant future for the college one goal, one student, and one building at a time.
But how has Hammond been able to maintain all of these obligations, and still find the time for himself, as well as his wife and four children, one might wonder?
“That man has set a goal,” answered Dr. Pandian. “He is focused.”
Another possible answer is simply Hammond’s apparent inability to tire. “That’s a man who does not require much sleep, and produces much work,” Sluis explains.
According to Bjorklund, Hammond is also able to relieve stressful situations by cracking jokes and using his sense of humor.
It can be said that all of these connections with students and faculty, all of these plans of a brilliant future, and all of this work would not be possible if Hammond did not care so deeply about North Central.
As Loscheider suspects, however, “(The president has) done what everyone hoped he would do, and that is to fall in love with this place… he’s at home.”
