FOR RELEASE: November 4, 1999

CSU Announces Four Finalists For Northridge Presidency

EDITORS NOTE: Photos and bios of the candidates are available at the CSU web site: www.calstate.edu/tier2/News.shtml

California State University Trustee Laurence Gould announced today (Thursday, Nov. 4, 1999) four candidates for the CSU Northridge presidency. The four will visit the campus next week and will hold open public forums for the candidates to talk with campus constituencies. The CSU Trustees are scheduled to select the new CSUN president at their Board meeting on Nov. 15-17.

The four candidates (in alphabetical order) are:

• Gretchen Bataille, provost and academic vice president and professor of English at Washington State University
• Antoine Garibaldi, provost and chief academic officer and professor of education at Howard University
• Jolene Koester, provost and vice president for academic affairs and professor of communication studies at CSU Sacramento
• Jane Pisano, senior vice president for external relations and former dean of the school of public administration at the University of Southern California.

"The selection committee has worked very hard over the past several months to choose from many outstanding individuals," said Gould, who is chair of the selection committee. "These finalists have various experiences and areas of expertise, but all of them are well-prepared to lead CSU Northridge through the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead."

The committee was organized in June, and national advertisements were placed over the summer. Altogether, about 100 candidates were involved in the selection process.

All four candidates will visit the Northridge campus on separate days next week and will hold public forums at 1:45 p.m. each day in the Performing Arts Center.

The schedule of visits is:

• Garibaldi, Monday, Nov. 8;
• Bataille, Tuesday, Nov. 9;
• Koester, Wednesday, Nov. 10;
• Pisano, Thursday, Nov. 11.

Bataille has served at her current position since 1997. Prior to that she was provost of the college of letters and science at UC Santa Barbara and associate dean of academic personnel of the college of liberal arts and sciences at Arizona State University. She earned a B.S. in English and an M.A. in education from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and a D.A. in English from Drake University.

Garibaldi has served at his current position since 1996. Prior to that he was vice president for academic affairs at Xavier University of Louisiana. He also was dean of the college of arts and sciences, chair of education and a member of the faculty at Xavier from 1982 to 1991. He earned a B.A. in sociology at Howard and a Ph.D. in educational psychology at the University of Minnesota.

Koester has served at her present position since 1996. Prior to that she served as vice president and in other executive positions in the academic affairs office at CSU Sacramento since 1989, and on the faculty there since 1983. She earned a B.A. from the University of Minnesota, an M.A. in communications arts from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a Ph.D. in speech communications from Minnesota.

Pisano has served at her current position since 1998 and had been a vice president and dean at USC since 1991. She was also president of the Los Angeles 2000 Committee and the 2000 Partnership and Director of Olympic Programs and Corporate Administration for the Times Mirror Company. She earned a B.A. at Stanford and a M.A. and Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins.