Thorp meets with campus community,
secures major creative writing gift

Chancellor Holden Thorp spent much of his first week on the job listening.

On July 1, his first day in office, Thorp met informally with student representatives over breakfast, convened his administrative cabinet and met individually with top faculty and staff leaders. He also secured a major private gift to enable creative writing students to study with some of the nation’s most notable writers.

Chancellor Holden Thorp meets with students July 1 at a welcome breakfast at the Campus Y organized by J.J. Raynor, student body president.

Throughout the week, he conducted a series of campus meetings with Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Bernadette Gray-Little and the deans of the graduate and professional schools.

The campus sessions launched the new chancellor’s efforts to gather information as the University’s students, academic leaders, staff and faculty discussed Carolina’s future.

“I’m excited about the opportunity to help make a great university — America’s first public university — even better,” Thorp said in a campuswide e-mail message. “I look forward to sharing my thoughts about those prospects during my installation address in October.”

Beyond the campus community, Thorp has met with public officials including Chapel Hill Mayor Kevin Foy and Orange County Commissioners Chair Barry Jacobs. This week he will meet with Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton.

John Woodard, left, Sutton’s Drug Store owner and pharmacist, chats with Thorp, center, and Chapel Hill Mayor Kevin Foy after they had lunch at Sutton’s July 2.

Creative writing gift
The gift from trustee Sallie Shuping-Russell will fund an innovative new course featuring the work of active writers who will hold a distinguished visiting professorship within the Creative Writing Program. The program is part of the Department of English and Comparative Literature in the College of Arts and Sciences.

The $666,000 gift qualifies for a $334,000 grant from the North Carolina Distinguished Professors Endowment Trust, bringing its total value to $1 million. The state fund, established in 1985 by the N.C. General Assembly, provides matching grants to recruit and retain outstanding faculty.

Shuping-Russell

“This gift gets my job as chancellor off to a great start, and I’ll always feel a special gratitude to Sallie,” Thorp said. “The rigorous program and intimate engagement with faculty in creative writing embody the commitments to originality and undergraduate experience that define Carolina. Sallie’s gift shows not only her extraordinary generosity, but also her understanding of our deepest values.”

Starting in the fall of 2009, five to six outstanding writers will come to campus to participate in the regularly scheduled course, “Living Writers,” which will honor Shuping- Russell’s mother, Margaret R. Shuping, a 1944 graduate of Carolina. The Sallie Shuping-Russell Distinguished Visiting Professors also will give public readings for the University community.  

“My career has been spent financing new technologies,” said Shuping-Russell, managing director at the New York City investment firm BlackRock, and member of the Board of Trustees, the UNC Foundation Investment Fund Co. Board of Directors and a former member of the Board of Directors of UNC Health Care.

“However, as science rolls forward, I want to make sure we don’t lose sight of the human experience of dealing with life in these times. That is what literature does best. With this professorship, I hope to inspire the next generation of writers to embrace that purpose.”

Michael McFee, director of creative writing, said the “Living Writers” course would be a model for the study and practice of contemporary literature.

“This kind of close contact with authors, especially when students are familiar with their work, gives young writers the chance to have extended conversations with those practicing the art and craft to which they aspire,” McFee said. “This a terrific opportunity for us and for Carolina.”

At a June 30 reception in South Building, outgoing Chancellor James Moeser passes the key to the building to Thorp, who became Carolina’s 10th chancellor the following day.