Dr. G. David Pollick

President, Birmingham-Southern College

Dr. G. David Pollick became the 12th president of Birmingham-Southern College in July 2004 after serving since 1996 as president of Lebanon Valley College in Annville, Pa., a four-year, private liberal arts institution also affiliated with the United Methodist Church.

He received his bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the University of San Diego; his master’s degree in philosophy from the University of Ottawa, Canada; his Ph.L. in philosophy from St. Paul’s University in Ottawa; and his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Ottawa.

During his eight years at Lebanon Valley, Pollick oversaw the most significant period of enrollment growth, program growth, and campus enhancements in the history of the college.

In his tenure at Birmingham-Southern, Pollick has introduced several initiatives, including plans to grow the college’s enrollment from 1,200 to 1,800. In May 2006, Birmingham-Southern’s Board of Trustees made the extraordinary decision to transition the college’s highly successful intercollegiate athletics program from NCAA Division I to NCAA Division III, adding the sports of football, men’s and women’s indoor and outdoor track, and men’s and women’s lacrosse. Subsequently, the college’s freshman class in fall 2007 was the largest in history with an increase of more than 50 percent to nearly 460 new first-year students. The fall 2008 freshman class was again expected to include a record number of new students.

Additional Pollick initiatives include increasing international study opportunities for students, adding programming that will strengthen the college’s position within the framework of national liberal arts colleges and society’s needs, and broadening awareness and recognition of the college across the nation and world, among other initiatives. The new Urban Environmental Studies major, one of only a handful of such programs in the nation, began accepting students in fall 2008, and the under-construction Urban Environmental Park on campus will serve as both a place of recreation and leisure for students and an outdoor laboratory for students in the new major.

Pollick also has served as co-chief executive officer and president of the Art Institute of Chicago and The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, acting president and provost and vice president for academic affairs at State University of New York College at Cortland, and dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and associate professor of philosophy at Seattle University in Washington. He also has held administrative and academic positions at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minn., and College of Saint Benedict in St. Joseph, Minn.

He has taught emotionally handicapped and neurologically and physically handicapped children from grades one through nine. He is a U.S. Navy veteran having served during the Vietnam War.

Pollick’s interest in architectural design and sculpture has led to the design, co-design, or consultation on some 15 college facilities and structures over the past decade, many of which have been recognized regionally and nationally.

He is the chair of the Alabama Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, a member of the board of directors and vice chair for investment of the executive committee of the Council of Independent Colleges, and a member of the Commission on International Initiatives of the American Council on Education; board of the National Association of Schools and Colleges of the United Methodist Church; board of directors of the Associated Colleges of the South; board of directors of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute; board of directors and member of the Birmingham Metro Diversity Coalition of Operation New Birmingham; board of trustees of the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce; executive board of the Greater Alabama Council of the Boy Scouts of America; advisory board of the Salvation Army of Jefferson, Shelby, and St. Clair counties in Alabama; and advisory committee of the Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellows, among other organizations.

Outside of academe, Pollick’s interests include sculpture, music, painting, reading, travel, and the outdoors, including hiking, kayaking, and golf.

His wife, Karen Bentley Pollick, is a nationally recognized concert musician and conductor. She performs on the violin, viola, piano, and hardangerfele. Holding bachelor’s and master’s degrees in violin from Indiana University, she has performed solo concerts across the U.S. and in Europe, Asia, Canada, and Russia. She has toured with the New York Philharmonic, the Bolshoi Ballet, Mikhail Baryshnikov’s “White Oak Dance Project,” and Barbra Streisand’s 1994 concert tour; recorded with the Dave Matthews Band and Evanescence; performed in the New Mexico and Seattle symphonies; and been concertmaster of the New York String Orchestra.