Campus Leader Shares Perspective on Leadership as Part of Interview Series
Ioana Patringenaru | November 10, 2008
Barbara Sawrey (left), associate vice chancellor of Undergraduate Education answers questions from Stacie Spector, associate vice chancellor of University Communications and Public Affairs.
Be organized; be patient; and be prepared. These were some of the pieces of advice that Associate Vice Chancellor Barbara Sawrey shared Wednesday with a standing-room only audience at Eucalyptus Point. Sawrey, the campus’ associate vice chancellor for Undergraduate Education, was the first guest in this year’s Perspectives on Leadership series offered by UCSD’s Human Resources department.
The talks are fashioned after the “Inside the Actors Studio” series offered on the Bravo network and fit squarely within UCSD’ succession planning efforts, said Grace Balch, director of Staff Education and Development. The goal is to give participants an innovative and informative look at leadership in higher education. Guests will talk about their careers and their experiences and share lessons they learned, she said.
Associate Vice Chancellor Stacie Spector serves as interviewer and master of ceremonies. Wednesday, Spector led Sawrey through an hour-long discussion. She said it was a privilege to ask Sawrey questions. “I look at her and I think I want to be more like her,” Spector said.
Associate Vice Chancellor Sawrey shared her leadership tips with Associate Vice Chancellor Spector and a standing-room only audience at Eucalyptus Point Wednesday.
Sawrey talked about why she chose to become an administrator; how she juggles her many responsibilities; and how she copes with challenges. Sawrey also took questions from the audience, talking about building relationships between staff and faculty and about getting more women involved in science.
Asked why she chose to study chemistry, Sawrey pointed to her family. Her grandfather, uncle and several brothers were engineers. She also recalled taking freshman chemistry and receiving the voluminous Handbook of Chemistry and Physics as a prize for her academic performance. Encouraged by the gift, she took more classes and chose chemistry as her major. To his day, she uses the handbook as a reward in her classes, she said.
Sawrey also took questions from the audience.
Sawrey went on to earn a bachelor’s, a master’s and a doctorate and joined the UCSD faculty in 1984. About 10 years ago, she became involved with the campus’ Academic Senate admissions committee. That led to a spot on the UC-wide Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools, which she later chaired. “I learned I had an interest and an ability to work in the area of undergraduate policy,” she said. She became associate vice chancellor for Undergraduate Education on July 1, 2007. In her new role, she acts as a liaison between the departments and colleges and Academic Affairs, she said.
As an administrator, she has learned to be patient, she said. “We all know that big systems move slowly,” she pointed out. She also said she learned to be persistent and repeat her message—sometimes in different ways—until she gets heard. Sawrey also said being prepared helped her juggle her responsibilities. When she was chair of the UC-wide Board of Admissions, she had to give presentations in front of the UC Regents. “I haven’t done anything more terrifying in my entire life,” she recalled. She held practice rounds at the Office of the President for several days. “I felt more confident,” she explained.
Asked how she juggles all her responsibilities, Sawrey confided that she is a big believer in making lists. “I love making lists so I can cross things off when I’m done,” she said. “It helps to download the information on a piece of paper so you don’t have to keep it in your head.” Earlier, she confided that she learned some of her management skills at an early age, as the eldest of nine children.
Grace Balch, director of Staff Education and Development, introduced the program.
During a question and answer session, Sawrey also talked about her efforts to bring more women to science careers. That earned her, in 2002, the American Chemical Society Award for Encouraging Women into Careers in the Chemical Sciences. Sawrey said she has worked with undergraduate student organizations. She also mentors many junior faculty and graduate students. But universities also have a larger role to play in encouraging students who major in the sciences to teach in middle schools and high schools, Sawrey said. That’s been shown to get more students excited about science, she said. “That’s where we can make a big impact,” she added. Staff member Julie Hampel, a manager in Environmental Health and Services, said she found the talk very helpful. Watching Sawrey, a campus leader, is in itself a learning experience, Hampel said. “I learned that being calm, cool, collected and witty is important,” she said.
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