Linda Oubré, president of Whittier College in California, has announced that she will step down from her post on June 30. She was the first African American and the first person of color to serve as president of Whittier College.
An alumni group called Save Whittier College had called for Dr. Oubré to resign due to poor fundraising results. A statement of no confidence in President Oubré’s leadership stated that “her presidency has been marked by dereliction of duty in maintaining the quality and reputation of undergraduate education, poor financial management, and failure to advance the mission of the college. A campus climate governed by fear and intimidation has led to low morale which has caused a dramatic attrition of faculty, staff, and students.”
In a statement to the campus community, which made no mention of the college’s problems, Dr. Oubré said “I will always be a part of Whittier College’s history. My five years as president of Whittier College will be ones that I will look back on with pride. It is our students, many of who, like me, are the first in their families to go to college, that have motivated and sustained me in this work. As I always say, Whittier College transforms lives; not only the lives of our students, but the lives of their families and their communities. At Whittier, we make a difference and we change the world one student at a time.”
Before coming to Whittier College, Dr. Oubré served as dean of the College of Business at San Francisco State University. Earlier, Dr. Oubré was executive director of corporate relations and business development, and chief diversity officer for the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Davis.
Dr. Oubré holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles, an MBA from Harvard Business School, and a doctorate in higher education management from the University of Pennsylvania.
