Episode 95 - Mark Roosevelt

Dan Sterenchuk and Tommy Estlund are honored to have as our guest, Mark Roosevelt. Mark Roosevelt became president of St. John’s College in Santa Fe on January 1, 2016. He is the seventh president of the campus.

​Roosevelt brings a history of accomplishing daunting tasks and a lifelong commitment to educational quality and equity. He earned his undergraduate and law degrees at Harvard University, where as a student he entered Massachusetts politics at a time of extraordinary racial conflict, serving as the campaign manager for the first African American ever elected to the Boston School Committee.​​

When Roosevelt was elected in 1986 to the Massachusetts State Legislature, he became chief sponsor of the “Gay Rights Bill,” which had failed to pass for more than two decades. After a tumultuous struggle, Roosevelt guided the bill into law in 1989, making Massachusetts only the second state in the nation to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment, housing, credit, and public accommodations.

In 1990 Roosevelt was named chair of the House Committee on Education. In that role he was the chief sponsor and co-author of the 1993 Education Reform Act, a comprehensive law that fundamentally restructured the way the Commonwealth funds and manages its public schools. More than 20 years later, the act still serves as the national model for comprehensive state action to guarantee school districts equitable resources and the accountability measures necessary for school improvement. As a result of the act, Massachusetts leads the nation in almost all categories of student and school performance.

After running for governor of Massachusetts as the Democratic nominee in 1994, Roosevelt served as managing director of the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education, and as an adjunct professor of politics and head of the Gordon Public Policy Center at Brandeis University.

In a career marked by taking on large challenges, Roosevelt sees his role at St John’s in a different light. He sees the college’s program as not only healthy but transformational. He believes that, working with the entire St. John’s community, his mandate is “to spread the gospel” - to increase awareness about St. John’s to the many students who would thrive at the college and to enhance its financial resources so it can continue to offer its inspirational education to many future generations.

“There is no other college like ours in the world, and no faculty or student body more dedicated to and passionate about learning,” he has written. “The program demands extraordinary commitment, and St. John’s challenges students to widen their horizons, overcome their fears, and even – in an era of hyper-partisan contentious discourse – change their minds. When a student comes to terms with nuance, ambiguity, and intellectual uncertainty – not to mention Ptolemy and Apollonius -- she leaves college ready to navigate the challenges of modern life.”

Roosevelt, a great-grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt, is married to Dorothy Roosevelt and is the father of two children, Matthew and Juliana.

Read more about Mark Roosevelt's bio here: https://www.sjc.edu/about/leadership/presidents/santa-fe-president

For more information about St. John's College, please visit their website: https://www.sjc.edu

Freeing Minds – A campaign for St. John’s College: https://freeingminds.sjc.edu

St. John’s College official Facebook page

https://www.facebook.com/stjohnscollege/

St. John’s College Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sjcsantafe/

Note: Guests create their own bio description for each episode.

The Curiosity Hour Podcast is hosted and produced by Dan Sterenchuk and Tommy Estlund.

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