ROUNDTABLE – Allyson Handley, Joyce Hedlund, Selma Botman

Presidential Women

Selma Botman, Joyce Hedlund, and Allyson Handley are in charge of three Maine institutions for many reasons: vision, for starters.

There are far too many female college and university presidents to interview in one Maine Ahead Roundtable. Beyond the three featured this month, other Maine college presidents who also happen to be women include Elaine Tuttle Hansen of Bates College; Danielle Ripich of University of New England; Cynthia Huggins, UMaine, Machias; Theo Kalikow, UMaine, Farmington; Barbara Woodlee, Kennebec Valley Community College; Berri Kramer, Heartwood College of Art; plus Sue McCulloch, director of UMaine’s Hutchinson Center.

We chose to speak with these three presidential women for several reasons. One was geography. Joyce Hedlund, the longtime president of Eastern Maine Community College, will soon be heading to a new post in Calais as president of Washington County Community College. Once there, she will have to drive for four and a half hours to visit Selma Botman at USM. She’ll need to gas up in Augusta, so we hope she’ll visit Allyson Handley at UMaine, Augusta along the way. After interviewing these three remarkable women, we believe they’d find a great deal in common.

As with all Roundtable features, Maine Ahead asks interviewees the same questions. Hedlund, Handley, and Botman answered most of them very differently, as each has walked a unique path. A few of the questions, however, had strikingly similar answers.

All three leaders are completely and sincerely sold on their institutions. They’re changing lives, and they know it. They all love being part of an ever-evolving machine that’s working to develop minds, shape character, and give people, some young and many not so young, the tools to go out and make a difference in the world. It’s not a lofty “make a difference”—it’s the pragmatic Maine version. Far more of their graduates will become medical assistants or own an auto repair shop or start a software company than become think-tank philosophers. And they, and the Maine business community that depends on those grads, are just fine with that.

Joyce Hedlund
President of Eastern Maine Community College, 1994–present
Born in Fort Kent, March 4, 1947

After 16 years at the helm of Eastern Maine Community College—during which time enrollment doubled as the school made the transition from a technical to a community college— Hedlund will become president of Washington County Community College in July. She grew up in Fort Kent as the youngest of seven children in a Franco-American family, where she was a math and science whiz and high school valedictorian. She earned her master’s degree and doctorate from the University of Maine, and worked in a number of higher-educational settings before beginning her career at EMCC.

One of Joyce Hedlund’s faculty members recently compared her to an onion: lots of depth, lots of layers, endless versatility. After working with her for decades, he said, he’d just found out that she is a watercolorist. But this “onion” is no prima donna. According to one story, Hedlund attended a dinner for evening nursing students and sat next to a bright, talkative student who asked what she did. “I’m the president of the college,” Hedlund said. The student blurted out, “But you’re so ordinary!” Hedlund’s reply was simply, “Thank you!” For Hedlund, ordinary meant accessible, and that, for this college president, is a bull’s-eye.

As a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?
When I was young we played school a lot, so I guess I thought I would become a teacher. Mum was a teacher, and I thought that it was likely that was what I was going to do as well. We also always had all kinds of animals. My father was doing veterinary work up in the Valley and the New Brunswick area. He’d work on the big animals, and often, we would go with him to the farms. I had a real love of science, and so I thought, too, I might be a veterinarian. I was accepted at the University of Maine as a biology major, but I really couldn’t afford to go to the University of Maine. So I went to Fort Kent State Teachers College, and it was a good choice for me.

You’ve had many opportunities in higher education. Why spend most of your career in Maine?
I love Maine. I think Maine has a certain quality to it that you don’t find in other states. If you were to go up to the St. John Valley, where I was raised, the feeling of family is very strong; the feeling of equalness and equity. I think Mainers have that expectation. They like their politicians, governors, and their people in leadership roles to be very approachable. They don’t want to call me Dr. Hedlund; they want to call me Joyce. As a person from Maine, that’s what I want as well.

You’re one of several women who are college presidents in Maine. Is there still a glass ceiling or other inequalities for professional women?
Pay equity continues to be the major inequality. It’s in Maine; it’s a national phenomenon. The glass ceiling may apply in some occupational areas, but I’m not seeing it so much in education—probably because education has a long history of having female superintendents and leaders at different levels.

In other occupations? It’s interesting, because as I look around this region, I see women in some pretty powerful positions—Michelle Hood, the head of Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems, Debbie Johnson at EMMC, Sister Norberta at St. Joseph Hospital—all powerful women. There are a lot of role models out there.

Do you think women in general approach leadership differently than men do?
No. I think that there are a range of leadership styles, and they’re not specific to gender. It depends on who you had as mentors throughout your development, on your life experience, your education, and what you believe about people and how
they excel.

When I became the president of EMCC, the man who had the position before me introduced a leadership style that I continued. It involves the whole idea that you’re not really at the top of the organizational chart, you’re at the bottom. A college president must work so others can work. Set the stage. Get out of the way, and let people do their job. The people at the top are the customers who benefit from what you’re doing: the students, the community, the faculty, and staff.

A Center for Work Life Policy study found that nearly 40% of professional women leave their careers for a while to meet family responsibilities—and many find it difficult to reengage at a level that matches their capabilities. Is that something you can relate to?
Before I came to Eastern, I had taken a job at an institution where I realized after about a month that the match was not good for me. I left that job without having another job lined up, and I was out of work for a while. It was very difficult because there were no jobs in this area. The opportunities for me to reenter as a dean were not there.

I did a lot of soul searching as to where I wanted to be in my life, because that experience rocked me a bit. It took about nine months to find other employment. What I had to accept was that I was going to enter at a lower employment level than I had been in before.

It took me a while to get beyond being driven by the title and the pay, to look at myself and ask what kind of work I wanted to do. What’s the best kind of work to suit me? Prior to that, I had been advancing through organizations; the more I advanced, the more distance I had between the students and me. I needed to get back in touch with students. When the counseling position [at EMCC] opened up, I knew. It was like, eureka! I don’t care how much this pays, I just want to do this.

Do you believe students in general understand the importance of a vibrant private sector? What is happening on your campus to encourage entrepreneurship?
By the very nature of our campus—we’re a community college with a strong technical focus—I think students do understand the need for vibrant businesses and a vibrant economy, and we try to instill that. Our business management program provides a very strong foundation that a student could use to develop a small business. Plus, we offer special entrepreneurship courses. I also believe one of the best ways to foster entrepreneurial behavior is to encourage student leadership in clubs and organizations.

As I look around this community, there are many EMCC graduates in very successful positions. Students earn a two-year degree at EMCC and then continue on to a four-year or even a master’s program. Generally our graduates develop a greater affinity to the four-year and master’s level colleges they attend. Many grads do come back to visit and say, “this is the place that gave me my start.” That makes us proud!

What are you doing at EMCC that is unique in trying to prepare students for the workforce?
When businesspeople visit the college, we’ll ask them, what are the skills you need most in potential employees? They say, “Teach the students to come in on time, to be polite, how to talk to other people.” So it’s all the soft skills. For example, some of the instructors will, in fact, meet students at the door if they’re late and say you can’t come in today. Pretty soon the pattern of being late is broken.

Keep in mind that most students come through the doors of EMCC having already made a career choice. Their sense of purpose is very clear, particularly for adults. There’s no stopping the adult student who really realizes he or she has the ability to earn a degree and succeed.

Allyson Hughes Handley
President of University of Maine at Augusta, 2008–present
Born in Windsor, Ontario, Canada, July 10, 1948

Allyson Handley served as senior policy advisor for postsecondary economic development initiatives in Kentucky before coming to UMA. Before that, she had served as president of Cogswell College in California and Midway College in Kentucky, where she was named by Kentucky Monthly as one of the state’s 12 most influential women. She has also been a dean and a vice president at National University in San Diego, and has taught at Johns Hopkins University, McGill, University of San Diego, and Spalding University. She received her BA from the University of Western Ontario, and an MEd and EdD from Johns Hopkins University.

Allyson Hughes Handley has been on one long continent-crisscrossing adventure. Born in Canada, she became a U.S. citizen in 2000, and has made her presence known in places as diverse as Toronto, Ontario; Baltimore, Maryland; San Diego, California; Frankfort, Kentucky; and Augusta, Maine.

A highly accomplished scholar, administrator, and, for a time, a state policy advisor, she exhibits a decided outward focus that, combined with a keen intellect, is a natural magnet for leadership. Handley looks at the accomplishments of her students and faculty, whether it’s securing an event with Maya Angelou or setting up the next generation of ITV learning, with as much pride and satisfaction as if she had completed every step herself.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? What people were most pivotal in your development?
Initially, interestingly, I thought about being a journalist. Then, for a while, I was a philosophy major. I still have the letter my father wrote me in my second-to-last year of university saying, I haven’t seen many advertisements in the Globe and Mail for philosophers, please choose something a little more focused. So I was an English major and taught high school English as my first career.

Regarding influences, my parents were certainly, particularly my father. I’m the eldest of five children and was a daughter that was wanted as a first child, which was fairly atypical in that generation, being born in the ’40s. My father passed away about three years ago, and it is still an incredible void for me. I feel fortunate to have had him for so many years, not only for the unconditional love, which was one of his gifts, but that notion of anything was possible. He was probably the most optimistic person I have ever known in my life.

How did you end up in Maine?
I’d had two other presidencies, the first presidency in Kentucky. My children, at that point, had all gravitated to northern California, and I really was missing them and so I took my second presidency at a small private institution in California, and then was asked by the newly elected governor of the state of Kentucky to come back and to be one of his top two reports. It was a wonderful opportunity to pick and choose some topics in areas that were important to Kentucky, but I wanted to get back to a presidency. I knew, from my Canadian roots, about the winters here, and loved the compelling mission of this institution, the notion of access—three-quarters of our students are mature, adult, nontraditional students. I was very impressed with the dedication the faculty and staff demonstrated during the search process here, and I’ve just loved it. It’s been a great assignment.

Do you think there is still a glass ceiling for women, or areas where they are severely underrepresented?
I think there is less of a glass ceiling certainly than there was many years ago for me. This is the second institution where I’ve been the first female president. I think that we are at an interesting time right now and I find even chatting with my own daughters—one is in her later 30s, the other is in her late 20s—they’ve grown up with such a different sense of opportunity that they don’t even question whether there are inequalities. But I still am in certain meetings—and this isn’t peculiar to Maine, it has been in my other lives—where I will have this kind of startle effect, where I’ll look around the room, and out of 20 people, there are only three women.

There are other areas where we could do more, particularly in science, technology, engineering, and math. We’ve made great strides in higher education and in terms of number of graduates, certainly in biology. There are more women biology faculty in the United States than there are men and that’s good. That wasn’t the case 15 years ago, but if you look at chemistry, physics, certain engineering areas, computer information systems, we know from national studies that there is still room for improvement.

Do you think men and women approach leadership differently? If so, how?
There are a number of national studies that have looked at this, and it is not opinion, it’s based upon research. I know, for example that, in terms of career paths for women, when they reach positions of greater responsibility, CEOs or presidents, there still tends to be a feeling of Ahhh, I made it, I better hunker down and stay where I am—whereas many male executives report that when they are at the top of their game is when they are looking for other opportunities.

What’s the most important advice you can give to one of your female students aspiring to high leadership?
First and foremost, get as much education as you possibly can; continue that education and pursue it, as that is an investment in yourself. Perfect your public speaking skills. We all know those anxiety scales where public speaking is right up there with death of a family member, getting a divorce, losing your job. In my estimation, we don’t do enough, throughout K–20 education to ensure that students become very comfortable speaking in public.

Third is become very comfortable and good at mathematics because no matter where you go or work, and in your personal life, if you can’t handle basic balance sheets and balancing your checkbook and being confident about financial data and information and decision making, it is going to be a great impediment.

And, finally, look for a mentor, someone that you admire. Most women are very responsive and interested in being able to have a role in being a sounding board or having someone shadow them. I think it is absolutely critical to expose yourself to women you admire who you perceive as strong leaders.

What is unique about UMaine, Augusta programs that business readers should know about?
UMA was founded on the notion of access. As I said, three-quarters of our students are nontraditional age. They have been out in the world of work, either in a part-time or a full-time capacity and, for whatever reason—sometimes sadly, they’ve lost a job, they’ve divorced and are faced with more challenging financial realities—they’re taking classes, either again or for the first time. We have students who are deployed in Iraq or Afghanistan who are taking classes through our online capacity. We do everything we can, be it through flexible schedules or creating customized programs, to help our students’ dreams come true.

How can Maine’s business community help?
One important way is providing internships so our students can have that all-important field experience. Another, I think, is by looking at potential new and enhanced partnerships. Maine General Hospital, for example, had a specific need to have appropriately educated and trained med lab technicians. There weren’t any programs that were available in the area, so we partnered with them to develop one.

I think you’re going to see, not only at UMA but at all institutions, more responsiveness to the business community, more working hand in hand.

Selma Botman

President of University of Southern Maine, 2008–present
Born in Boston, Mass., December 12, 1950

Selma Botman came to USM after serving as executive vice chancellor and university provost at the 230,000-student City University of New York (CUNY), where she was in charge of overseeing policies governing its 19 colleges and more than 100 research centers. She also helped develop a new School of Public Health, CUNY’s first-ever online degree, and other projects. Botman earned a master’s degree in Middle Eastern studies and a doctoral degree in History & Middle Eastern studies, both from Harvard University. She also earned a bachelor’s degree from Brandeis University and bachelor of philosophy from Oxford University.

If you were to predict the most likely candidate to succeed Richard Pattenaude as president of USM (pop. 10,000), it wouldn’t be Selma Botman. Botman, a high-powered scholar and author specializing in Middle Eastern studies, came from 230,000-student City University of New York, where she was in charge of a breathtaking list of initiatives. But, like many a transplanted Mainer, she visited and fell in love.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
My mother was a hairdresser and that was what I initially aspired to because that’s what I knew.It was only after I got to college that the world of possibility was open to me and so it was really university education that transformed my life and my aspirations. I had one professor in undergraduate school and one professor in graduate school who were mentors, gifted teachers, serious researchers, and they provided role models and I sought to emulate them throughout my professional life.

You have had many opportunities in front of you as a successful college administrator. Why Maine?
I had a wonderful job in New York City. Our younger daughter, who was about to graduate from Bates College, introduced us to Peaks Island. My husband and I ride bikes, and we were told, take your bikes over to Peaks Island, and you will fall in love. So we brought our bikes on the ferry, and rode around. We stopped by Port Island Realty—this is a true story—to see what they had to offer. They showed us this little house that I fell in love with, and I said to my husband, I think the stars are aligning. The rest is history.

You came of age in the “women’s lib” era. In your opinion, do inequalities remain for women in the workplace? Is there still a glass ceiling?
I have two daughters, and they live in an entirely different world than I lived in, so the world has changed for the better. The most complicated thing for women is not only the glass ceiling but how to mix motherhood and professional life. The tension is real because women are divided. I say that because I felt it when I was raising my children. Motherhood was the single most important thing in my life, bar none—along with my husband, but he’s an adult! I understand the conflicts of trying to meld family and work. It is the hardest challenge for women.

With regard to the workplace, things have changed. Is it perfect yet? No. But have we had huge progress? We absolutely have. If you were talking to college presidents of 25 years ago, you would not have been talking to three female presidents. We are still a minority, because we started later, but we are making great progress.

In your experience, do you believe that women approach leadership differently than men?
I think women are predisposed toward managing collaboratively. They tend to talk more to the staff and associates and colleagues as part of the decision-making process.

A Center for Worklife Policy study found that nearly 40% of professional woman leave their careers for a time to meet family responsibilities and many of them find it difficult to reengage. Did you experience this?
That wasn’t my experience, attributable to the fact that I had my children in the community where I grew up, so my mother and my mother-in-law and two aunts were available to help me. We have a 19th-century family structure, so my girls were raised communally, by women, and my kids are the beneficiaries, and the grandmothers were the beneficiaries. We had lost our grandfathers early, so these kids, they were the first grandchildren on both sides of the family and, for a very long time, the only game in town. So my husband and I were able to rely on our families to help.

In what ways can Maine’s colleges help keep talented woman connected, even if they step aside from full-time work for a time?
As a place of employment, we understand that there are complexities in the lives of people and I like to think that we will make accommodations, not for a lower level of work expected or success expected, but rather things like flex time, and working from home a little bit if that helps.

In my view, the goal would be no gender distinction. Both men and women appreciate that most working parents have complicated lives, but we are still at the point where mothers do, I think, disproportionately more raising of the children. Fathers are involved, but the lion’s share of the responsibility remains with women.

Do you believe your students understand the importance of a vibrant private sector? What is USM doing to encourage entrepreneurship?
I think students are tremendously sophisticated. We have a business school that teaches entrepreneurship; we have a program in art and entrepreneurship where we’re marrying the creative arts with business experience. A student who graduated from that program, Becky Stockbridge McKinnell, started a web development business in Portland called iBec Creative. She has hired a number of employees, bought a house in Westbrook, though she’s not from Maine, and is contributing to the economy, and was named by BusinessWeek as one of the top-100 entrepreneurs in America under 25. Isn’t that wonderful? I think Becky is the exception that proves the rule.

Educational access is central to USM’s mission. What are some of the user-friendly opportunities that you offer that you’d like more businesspeople to know about?
We have a continuing education unit at USM, and we seek to do more in online education at USM because we recognize that people are time-bound as well as place-bound.

We also have something at USM which is award-winning called a prior learning assessment, where a student comes to us having been in a job or industry for X-number of years and demonstrated certain competencies. Why would we want to ask those students to take beginner classes? We have someone here at USM who evaluates people’s work experience, their work transcripts, is able to assign credit for competencies that they have achieved—so that people who want to come to the school for the first time, or come back to school, don’t have to start from square one.

Tagged as: Allyson Handley, Joyce Hedlund, Selma Botman