Co-Provosts Create a New Model of Leadership

The transition of leadership at St. Catherine University began in early March with two women, a dry-erase board and a novel idea. Provost Anita Thomas’s pending departure from the Roman Catholic women’s institution in Minnesota hadn’t formally been announced, but Dianne Oliver and Denise Baird, who were associate provost and assistant provost, respectively, knew the position could soon be vacant. So they took to the whiteboard and started brainstorming. Baird and Oliver both thought about the breadth of responsibilities the position encompassed, discussed the institutional strains caused by the turnover of leadership and considered the pros and cons of an internal successor to Thomas versus an external leader.