When University President-select Lee Bollinger returns to Ann Arbor next semester, he will not only be moving into the Fleming Administration Building - he also plans to move into the classroom.
Bollinger, a seasoned scholar on the First Amendment, said he would like to continue teaching a course on the ramifications of the amendment while he is president of the University.
Bollinger will not be the first University president to split his time between Fleming and the classroom.
Harold Shapiro taught courses in economics while he was president.
Interim President Homer Neal, whose specialty is physics, has taken a hiatus from teaching since he inherited the post of presidency last July.
"It is important for an administrator to always feel that there's something you can go back to happily when your time as an administrator is over," Bollinger said.
This will not be the first time Bollinger has had to balance his duties as an administrator and as a professor. During his two-year tenure as Dartmouth College provost, Bollinger taught a course on constitutional law.
"In a lot of ways he seems like an average guy, but he is also very brilliant in his field," said Dartmouth senior Andrew May. "He is a very graceful speaker and well liked by everyone who takes the class."
Bollinger said that although he anticipates the balancing act to be challenging, the experience should be rewarding.
"It's the best way I know to stay in touch with what students are doing and faculty are doing on a daily basis," he said.
"The heart of the institution is in the classroom."
Traditionally, University presidents have abstained from teaching while serving as president.
But former University President James Duderstadt said that although he was not teaching in a traditional classroom setting, he was constantly teaching in other ways when he was in office.
"I found myself teaching all the time through meetings with different groups, alumni and legislators," Duderstadt said. "It seemed like all I did was teach them about the University."
Duderstadt said he did not want to teach during his presidency because of his erratic and unpredictable schedule.
"The president doesn't have control over time," he said. "Emergencies may come up. One of the reasons why I never scheduled teaching is because I didn't think it would be fair to students."
Since stepping down from his post as president, Duderstadt has returned to the teaching faculty. He is not lecturing in his field of speciality, nuclear physics, however - instead he is teaching a seminar in higher education and the future of the University.
"At the beginning, it was exciting that the former University president was teaching the class," said Rackham student Joe Salvatore. "That's one of the reasons why I took the class. Now it's less of a feeling of awe and more of a feeling of respect."
Duderstadt said he hopes to develop a course in the Residential College that looks 20-30 years into the future. Duderstadt said the course would begin next year.
- Daily Staff Reporter Jeff Eldridge contributed to this report.