Dartmouth College inaugurates new president

(NECN: Lauren Collins, Manchester, NH) – Dartmouth College is the first Ivy League school to inaugurate an Asian-American president. Jim Young Kim took over from James Wright in July and officially took the reins today. A dozen speakers heralded Dr. Kim for his professional accomplishments and personal character. Everyone around Hanover, New Hampshire, is excited to see how those qualities play out on campus. While all the pomp and circumstance of this year’s convocation celebrates Dr. Jim Yong Kim, the Big Green’s new president turned his inaugural remarks to the new kids on campus – the class of 2013: “I hope you understand that i have very high expectations for you and each of you is capable of exceeding even my highest expectations,” said Dr. Kim as he spoke to a crowd on the campus green. Freshman Mike Martell was impressed by the sense that “he didn’t just want us to succeed, he expects us to do big things.” “Especially to hear someone of dr. Kim’s stature addressing us and encouraging us and really giving us a lot of great compliments it was quite inspiring and amazing,” says Freshman Arun Gomatam. Dr. – now president Kim – comes to Dartmouth from a distinguished career in the health sciences. A trained physician and anthropologist, he was a professor at Harvard’s Medical School and School of Public Health, a past director at the World Health Organization, and a co-founder of the poverty outreach group Partners in Health. Born in Seoul, South Korea, he’s also the first Asian American named president of an ivy league school and follows just 16 other leaders in Dartmouth’s 240 year history. “All of these leaders served Dartmouth in diligence and skill. To follow in their footsteps is deeply humbling for me.” Dr. Kim’s appointment is a milestone in diversity and a tribute to Dartmouth’s multicultural past. It is also a hint to where the school is headed. “Dr. Kim, you are a perfect fit to be our first new president of the new millennium,” said student body president Frances Vernon, ’13, who encouraged the school and it’s new president to be open to evolution, and even revolution. Dr. Kim never directly addressed the heated debate over whether Dartmouth college should become a fully-titled university, but he did pledge to vigorously promote faculty research: “Let me be clear,” he said. “Not only will we support research by our faculty, we will also expect every Dartmouth student to engage in significant original scholarship at their time at the college.” His vision and leadership has a fan in his predecessor, president emeritus Jim Wright who believes Dr. Kim is “going to be an inspiring president. He’s already inspired me.”