wfn.org | Janet Morgan Riggs Named President of ELCA's Gettysburg College

[<NEWS@ELCA.ORG>]

Title: Janet Morgan Riggs Named President of ELCA's Gettysburg College
ELCA NEWS SERVICE

>February 13, 2009  

Janet Morgan Riggs Named President of ELCA's Gettysburg College
09-043-FI

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- On Feb. 6 the trustees of Gettysburg
College, Gettysburg, Pa., appointed Dr. Janet Morgan Riggs as the
college's 14th president. Riggs has served the college as interim
president since March 2008 when Dr. Katherine Haley Will
resigned. Gettysburg is one of 28 colleges and universities of
the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

"Since 1981 Gettysburg College and the local community have
been my home. I am thrilled to be asked to serve my alma mater in
this way," said Riggs, 53.

"I want to thank members of this community who have been so
supportive of me.  Gettysburg College has just opened one door
after another for me, and I am just so grateful for that," she
said.

"We are all very excited to make this appointment," said
James M. Weaver, King of Prussia, Pa., chair of the Gettysburg
College board of trustees.

"Dr. Riggs has excelled in a number of key administrative
appointments, most recently interim president at Gettysburg, and
we know that she will move full steam ahead in building campus-
wide support for her vision," Weaver said. "As an alumna who has
also been a 20-year professor and a provost at Gettysburg, she
deeply understands the lives of our students and faculty, who are
the heart of our academic mission."

Born in suburban Philadelphia, Riggs graduated in 1977 from
Gettysburg College. She earned a master's degree and a doctorate
in social psychology from Princeton University, Princeton, N.J.

Riggs returned to Gettysburg in 1981 as an instructor in the
psychology department; she became a professor and chair of the
department. She served the college as executive assistant to the
president 1991-1994 and as interim provost 1995-1996 and 2006-
2007 before being appointed provost in 2007.

Riggs and her husband Ed, a teacher at Gettysburg Area
Middle School, are the parents of three adult children.

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a four-year
residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With a student
body of approximately 2,500, it is located on a 200-acre campus
adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park.
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>The home page for Gettysburg College is at
>http://www.gettysburg.edu/ on the Web.

For information contact:

John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or news@elca.org
http://www.elca.org/news
ELCA News Blog: http://www.elca.org/news/blog