This afternoon, UVA President John Casteen introduced Harry Harding as the first Dean of the University’s Frank Batten Sr. School of Leadership and Public Policy.
Casteen said that UVA founder Thomas Jefferson’s emphasis on useful science and useful knowledge was a driving force behind the creation of the school. Of course, that was facilitated by the largest gift in UVA history, a $100 million donation from Landmark Communications, Inc. executive Frank Batten, Sr.
“This is an enormously wonderful opportunity for me,” Harding told C-VILLE. “This is a chance of a lifetime.”
Harding, a China scholar, served as dean of the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University for 10 years. Prior to that, he was a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program at the Brookings Institution.
The school is intended to be closely linked to other schools and programs in the University, and, Harding said, will address four main concerns: the meaning and study of leadership; an integrated and united look at domestic and foreign public policy; state-of-the-art training for students for service at all levels of governance—local, state, national and international level; and a successful integration of graduates in the private sector.
“Most schools of public policy, even if they have a foreign component, it’s an umbrella concept,” he said, highlighting that both disciplines are still taught separately. “I am hoping that we will be able to integrate them more than any other school.”
New Dean Harry Harding will begin his term July 1.