Posted on: Saturday, June 30, 2001

Mortimer bids aloha to tenure as UH president

By Jennifer Hiller
Advertiser Education Writer

With a pile of lei and an honorary degree in hand, University of Hawai'i President Kenneth Mortimer left Bachman Hall yesterday for the last time.

Mortimer, who oversaw the 10-campus UH system for eight years, will move this weekend to Bellingham, Wash., where he was once the president of the University of Western Washington. He will write, consult and become a senior scholar with the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems based in Boulder, Colo.

Bidding him aloha, officials from the University of Ryukyus in Okinawa presented Mortimer with an honorary doctorate of philosophy yesterday to thank him for the partnership he helped develop between the two universities.

Mortimer has helped strengthen a student exchange agreement between the schools, bring scholars from the University of Ryukyus to the East-West Center, develop faculty and performing arts exchanges, and continue a tradition of training Japanese medical students at the John A. Burns School of Medicine, said Moshin Morita, president of the University of Ryukyus.

"It's about our sincere gratitude to Dr. Mortimer," Morita said. "This is also an expression of our wish in the future to extend this relationship."

While Mortimer's time at UH was marked by declining budgets, financial crises and plummeting faculty morale, he said his work at UH helps the system in the long run. He was able to win constitutional autonomy for UH, establish a strong fund-raising base and direct money to innovative academic programs.

"I'm very confident of my time here at the University of Hawai'i and I'm very confident for my long-range impact," he said. "I feel good."

Evan Dobelle, the former president of Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., will replace him Monday.