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University of La Verne installs new president
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The 120-year-old University of La Verne will install a new president, Devorah Lieberman, Friday afternoon.
If La Verne doesn’t sound familiar, you’re not alone. Lieberman, a veteran of colleges on both coasts, had to pause when an executive search firm called her.
"I had never heard of the university, even though I grew up in Covina, California, which is just a town over the hill," she said.
Part of Lieberman’s challenge as incoming president will be to raise the school's profile. The private university, just north of Pomona, was founded in the 19th century by the Church of the Bretheren, a German Christian denomination. All of its 17 previous presidents have been male members of that church. Lieberman is the first non-Bretheren.
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She says she’ll continue the university’s mission to instill four values in students, a commitment to lifelong learning, making community a better place and the third, Lieberman explained, "is that every student who graduates will have a commitment to diversity, community, inclusivity, making their own community a better place." The fourth, she added, "is that every student will have what we call a values orientation."
Lieberman said she wants to find a way to connect the main school with students who attend the university’s nine satellite campuses, including schools in Burbank, Ontario, and Bakersfield. She said she's enlisting the University of La Verne community this year to help chart the direction of the little known university in the next decade.
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