http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/20100501_Rutgers-Camden_chancellor_making_his_mark.html
Posted on Sat, May. 1, 2010
Rutgers-Camden chancellor making his mark
By Matt Katz
Inquirer Staff Writer
The plan, he thought, was to use the Philadelphia pedigree, the Ivy
League credentials, the congressional office experience, the polished
persona - and run for office in Philadelphia.
His mother knew better.
"I knew it would be academic all along," Carolyn Pritchett said.
She was right. Wendell Pritchett's ceaseless curiosity was best suited
to the lecture hall, even if a politician's charm and a propensity
toward public policy still lingered.
Now, Pritchett, who has a doctorate in urban history and a legal mind
fascinated by the complexities of urban transformation, has found a
laboratory where his passions collide: Camden.
Rutgers-Camden's new chancellor is a West Philly resident, renowned
expert on urban affairs, former policy director to Mayor Nutter,
assistant coach for his daughter's otherwise all-boys Little League
team, and the newest player in Camden's latest effort at revitalization.
Pritchett, 45, said he now has no interest in elected office. Instead,
he has bold plans for Rutgers University's sometimes overlooked Camden
campus, and those plans come just as the political establishment has
divined the city's colleges and hospitals, dubbed "eds and meds," as
the best hope for saving this troubled city.
Eleven months after leaving as associate dean of the University of
Pennsylvania Law School to become chancellor, Pritchett hasn't saved
anything yet. But he has left his mark both at the chancellor's office
in a stately downtown rowhouse and at City Hall, two blocks away.
Consider his commitment to build two dorms, his mandate to attract
more students from city high schools, and his goal to quadruple the
number of students living on campus. He is opening a new nursing
school and presiding over the launch of two Ph.D. programs - one in
computational and integrative biology, the other in public affairs.
Both are intended as new niches for the school.
Pritchett also has vowed to double university spending with city and
Camden County vendors in five years, in an effort to help local
businesses.
"It's really extraordinary how much he's accomplished in less than a
year," said his colleague Steven Diner, Rutgers-Newark's chancellor.
"He's tactful and friendly, but also forceful."
A city kid who grew up on the other side of the Delaware River, at
Second and Locust Streets, where his parents still live, Pritchett has
drawn the most attention for his public and aggressive efforts to
engage students with the city.
In January, at the school's first Civic Engagement Symposium,
Pritchett promised to turn the school into a "national model for a
civically engaged university."
He opened an Office of Civic Engagement, intended as a bridge between
the city and the 6,100-student campus. He wants more city internships
and more classes like one that began this year on the history of Camden.
And as a child of two public-school teachers, Pritchett desperately
wants to aid the city's schools, among the worst in the state. He has
hired a director of public-school partnerships to lead the charge.
Pritchett meets with the city school superintendent monthly to discuss
a future Rutgers partnership with a North Camden school, and to aid
the district with analysis of student data. At these meetings, the
educational leaders also monitor the progress of teenagers in the
expanding Future Scholars program, where Rutgers staff members mentor
Camden students toward a possible four-year Rutgers scholarship.
And through the Center for Urban Research, which Pritchett created, he
sees an opportunity to attract national experts on cities to be
professors.
"For a long time we didn't have an identity for the campus, and now
he's working toward that," said Gloria Bonilla-Santiago, director of
Rutgers' Center for Strategic Urban Community Leadership.
"He's a new type of leadership, like Obama-type of leadership. It's
refreshing, it's new, it's hopeful, it's the medicine we needed here
on our campus."
As an engaging speaker, a former law professor, and the first African
American to lead a Rutgers campus, the Obama comparison is tempting.
Pritchett has certainly shown an affinity for politics.
Early in his career he directed the district offices of former U.S.
Rep. Thomas M. Foglietta, the South Philadelphia Democrat, and he
chaired the Obama campaign's Urban Policy Task Force.
Pritchett had a stint as Nutter's director of policy, and after Dana
L. Redd was elected mayor of Camden last year, he cochaired her
transition team. The two now speak about once a week.
"He has revitalized the Rutgers-Camden campus, and he's really raised
[the school's] profile," said Redd, an alumna herself. "We've been so
low-profile for so many years."
Nutter said Pritchett's leadership of Redd's transition team shortly
after arriving in the city was "classic Wendell."
"He's one of these people who gets folks together. He's often the glue
of various relationships," Nutter said last week.
Pritchett is "not only hard-working but certainly forward-thinking,"
Nutter said. "It was always clear that Wendell's destination was
running something of a major organization, and providing leadership."
A Philly kid
Growing up, Pritchett played sports with friends in his Society Hill
neighborhood, his mother remembered, but mostly he was "so interested
in his studies." Even in high school, she said, when procrastination
usually reigns, Pritchett finished his papers early.
"His interests are so varied," she said.
Pritchett graduated from the private Friends Select, but his parents
worked in the city's public schools. His mother taught English at
several high schools, and his father, Wendell E., a classical pianist,
was the district's director of music.
A touch on the nerdy side, with a deep voice and fast-paced speaking
style, Pritchett is warm and relaxed, even slouching a bit in his
chair. He now lives in West Philadelphia with his wife, Anne Kringel,
the director of legal writing at Penn Law, and their two daughters,
and has no immediate plans to move to Camden.
But he's fascinated by it, as the animation of his voice indicates,
and that's reflective of a long-standing interest in cities. His
doctoral thesis at Penn turned into the first of his two books -
Brownsville, Brooklyn: Blacks, Jews, and the Changing Face of the
Ghetto.
"Policy makers' decisions about cities was something I was
particularly interested in," he said.
His modesty, cited as a notable character trait by several colleagues,
comes through when asked why governmental policies have failed in
Camden: "I've thought about it a lot, and I haven't really got a good
answer yet."
Later, he added: "I really don't know what is going to revitalize the
whole city."
But he believes that by building Rutgers' campus and working with the
other downtown institutions, the city can plant seeds for recovery.
Public investment - which Camden has seen billions of dollars in, much
to the aggravation of some of its suburban neighbors - cannot, alone,
bring a city back, he said. But "with growth in downtown we can
leverage investments in other neighborhoods," he said.
A Camden spokesman
Earning $275,000 in his new position, Pritchett still has obligations
in Pennsylvania, including his role as vice chair of the Philadelphia
Redevelopment Authority and a member of the
Pennsylvania State Planning Board.He said he uses his time off campus
to sell Rutgers-Camden as a regional institution.
"I do think of myself as a spokesman for the city," he said. "Part of
my job is to represent the potential and current attributes of the
city."
In New Jersey, he spends a lot of time in New Brunswick, where in
meetings he sits to the immediate left of Richard L. McCormick,
Rutgers' president, who hired Pritchett from among three finalists.
McCormick said he was impressed by Pritchett's "deep knowledge" of
cities, particularly because he wants to "align our programs with
urban needs."
But he was also impressed with Pritchett's personality.
"There's nothing that's ponderous or pompous about him," McCormick
said. "There's a lightness of spirit."
Personality is important in this role: McCormick believes Pritchett
will be a successful fund-raiser, a crucial part of the job.
"He's already a force in the South Jersey community," he said.
Pritchett notes that the bulk of his job is administrative - running a
university, not leading a city.
But his mother, Carolyn, notes that "cities just interest him
tremendously." So wherever he goes, she says, he will ask one
question: "Where can I make a difference?"
Contact staff writer Matt Katz at 856-779-3919 [email protected].
