Lindholm leaves after 38 years

Dean of Cook Commons and Assistant Professor of American Studies Karl Lindholm has announced his plans to retire as part of the College’s retirement incentive program. His retirement will end a 38-year career at Middlebury, four of which were as a student.

While Lindholm’s official duties will end in December 2010, he is adamant that he will remain involved in the life of the College.
With children in the Middlebury public schools, his wife the chair of the English and American Literature Department and many friends at the College, he hopes to “find a way to be useful and maintain positive relationships [with the College community].”

“I’m not going to miss [my time at Middlebury],” said Lindholm, “because I’m not going anywhere.”

The Renaissance man of the Middlebury administration, Lindholm worked in a wide variety of positions during his time at Middlebury.
He has been affiliated with all five commons, taught in the American Studies Department, acted as the Dean of Students, Associate Dean of the College and Dean of Off-Campus Study and Advising.

While some have coznsidered Lindholm a “jack of all trades, but a master of none,” Lindholm prefers to see his “hybrid” status as a zpositive thing. He opts for the label “master jack of all trades,” and looks back on his time in a wide variety of positions fondly.

But, he worries about what his retirement could bring the College. In an e-mail to colleagues earlier this month, he said the College would lose an advocate for the commons system.

Because the commons system is a decentralized one, with multiple deans and student support staff, it “inevitably involves expenses,” which could result in a decrease in the program’s importance given the current economic climate.

Lindholm nevertheless emphasizes that this “blurring of the boundaries” between residential and academic life is important and vital in creating a “one-school approach.”

Lindholm’s tenure in two now-defunct positions — Dean of Off-Campus Study and Advising — has given him a special insight into the role of each in maintaining the College’s support system.
Study abroad was previously organized by the academic departments, where each department would coordinate with its own schools abroad. There was no “Study Abroad Office,” but rather a “Programs Abroad Committee.” Lindholm became known, informally, as the “study abroad advisor” because of his role in study abroad coordination and advising.

“Then,” he said, “the world got big,” and all study abroad was organized into what is today known as the Study Abroad Office. While he enjoyed the trips abroad he was able to take as Dean of Off-Campus Study, he acknowledges that the reorganization was a logical step and strengthened the study abroad program.

He sees a similar reorganization occurring in the absorption of the Dean of Advising position. Much of his work has been taken by the Center for Teaching, Learning and Research (CTLR), which now handles informal advising.

Furthermore, Lindholm notes the strong system of informal advising at Middlebury. For example, when a student’s advisor goes on leave or needs additional advising, he or she can turn to the CTLR, commons deans, department chairs or other professors for personal and academic support.

Lindholm’s academic specialty is the study of baseball. He regularly teaches American Studies classes on baseball, and particularly on the early Negro leagues. Other courses he has taught have covered the literature of the Vietnam War era and cross-cultural literature.
Cook Commons Residential Advisor Emily Picciotto is sure that Lindholm will be missed. Having had the ability to compare Lindholm to two other Cook deans, Picciotto believes he has done a good job.

In the end, it “comes down to people skills […] Karl has a way of talking that makes everyone respect him, but feel at ease at the same time,” she wrote in an e-mail.

Cook First-Year Counselor Abhishek Sripad ’11 agrees.

“His endless supply of hilarious anecdotes is what makes him a great person to be around,” he said in an e-mail.