- Michael Geisler
Dr. Michael Geisler, vice president for risk and compliance and professor of German at Middlebury College, has been named the next president of Manhattanville College.
Manhattanville’s Board of Trustees unanimously appointed Geisler, who comes to the school after 23 years at Middlebury.
Geisler replaces Dr. Jon C. Strauss, who plans to retire in June after five years as school president. He will begin his role as president on July 1.
“The Board and the Search Committee are strongly united that we”™ve found in Dr. Geisler a most inspirational, thoughtful and collaborative leader who comes with strong academic credentials, entrepreneurial and fiscal sensibilities, new business development and fundraising expertise,” said Marcia Pearce Dewitt, chair of the presidential search committee and vice chair of the board of trustees. “Geisler is clearly a person of vision who embodies the qualities and talents we seek in our next president.”
Geisler taught for more than 20 years at Middlebury, and oversaw college-wide planning and risk management. He also served as vice president for language schools at the Vermont college, where he helped establish two new language schools in Hebrew and Korean as well as new graduate programs in Arabic, Chinese and Hebrew.
Geisler, who has also taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Guilford College, said in a statement he saw his appointment as an opportunity for Manhattanville to “reaffirm its position of leadership during the next decade.”
“It is an honor to be chosen as president of Manhattanville College and to join an institution with a proven commitment to building community through education, and to acquiring wisdom through social and political engagement,” said Geisler, a native of the former West Germany.
Officials said Strauss will be recognized for “increasing financial stability, building institutional capacity and developing new academic programs” during his time at Manhattanville.
