Spring 2001
Koester constructs a future
Photo courtesy of CSUN
Jolene Koester (B.A. magna cum laude '71, Ph.D. '80, speech communication) is perhaps the only person in higher education overseeing more construction than U of M President Mark Yudof. From her presidential trailer, Koester, who in July 2000 became the fourth president of California State University at Northridge (CSUN), is leading a 28,000-student campus that was hit in 1994 by a 6.7-magnitude earthquake, the most costly natural disaster ever to occur on a U.S. campus. This spring, she is finally moving into new presidential quarters--in a building with a solid foundation.
Born and raised in tiny Plato, Minn., Koester says she felt like a "kid in a candy store" when she arrived on the Minneapolis campus in the late sixties. An outstanding high school debater, she was recruited by a number of schools when her Glencoe, Minn., high school debate coach intervened. Convinced that Koester belonged at the U, he worked with University admissions staff to secure a competitive scholarship offer.
Going international
Having made the leap from a town of 250 to a U of M campus of more than 40,000, Koester was intent on making her world even bigger--through international experiences. She especially credits two faculty members, Forrest Moore and Joe Mestenhauser, with widening her sense of the world and her role in it and helping her get a Fulbright Grant and a U of M Student Exchange Scholarship in 1968 to study at Osmania University in India.
"My study-abroad experience in India transformed my life," Koester says. Indeed, so taken was she with her international experience that after completing her master's degree at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, she returned to the U to work in the International Study and Travel Center as the educational coordinator.
Koester's work with students was a revelation. As she helped students develop their international learning agendas, she decided to get a Ph.D. and direct an international studies office. Once again, faculty members touched her life in powerful ways.
Of Professor Ernest Bormann, one of her Ph.D. advisers, she says, "No better doctoral adviser could be created. He treated graduate students as though they had something to offer. It was a wonderful, challenging, thought-provoking time, one that helped shape my commitment to higher education."
Today an expert in intercultural communication with five books (one in its third edition) and scores of articles and presentations on the subject, Koester has put into both words and deeds her zeal for international education. At CSUN, she presides over a campus that is known for its international programs and is thoroughly multicultural, with "no single majority population"--reflecting the very diverse population base of the surrounding San Fernando Valley.
A first-generation student who grew up in a family determined that their daughter would go to college, Koester feels a special connection with CSUN students, many of whom are also the first in their families to attend college. "It's easy to see the incredible impact that Cal State has had," she says, "and exciting to see students develop their talents."
Opportunities and challenges ahead
Koester notes that CSUN faces many of the challenges--"faultlines" is her word--that other public institutions face at a time of dramatic social and economic change. These include "very strongly competing demands for public funds" and the creation of "new knowledge at the intersection of the disciplines." As worlds of knowledge converge, she says, educational structures within the academy undergo something akin to seismic shifts, with realignments presenting both opportunities and challenges.
Like the U of M, she says, CSUN increasingly is meeting these challenges by developing partnerships and philanthropic support to better serve both students and the surrounding community.
Clearly, Koester has her work cut out for her. But she relishes the challenge. The best thing about being president, she says, is "being able to make a real difference at a place that delivers high quality education." At the same time, she is sometimes amazed to have come so far: "I wonder, who is this woman?" she marvels.
With a niece and nephew at the U and a proud father in Plato, Koester has stayed in touch. She hopes that other Minnesota students will follow in her footsteps. Her advice is simple. "Take advantage of every opportunity," she says. "And don't be intimidated."