Wheeling Jesuit University's Executive Vice President James Birge has been appointed interim president of the university, after the resignation of the Rev. Joseph R. Hacala, S.J. on Sept. 16.
Hacala resigned due to health reasons and is currently at Mayo Clinic receiving treatment for a rare disorder. The university's board of directors, led by board chairperson Col. Carol Yarnall, retired U.S. Air Force, and its board of trustees, led by chairman the Rev. Robert Niehoff, S.J., along with the full board and its religious superiors agreed with Hacala's recommendation that Birge take on the interim role, while the board conducts a search for a permanent president.
Noting his confidence in Birge's wisdom, experience, and leadership abilities, Hacala recommended Birge's appointment to the board. “I know that Dr. Birge is fully capable of seeing the University through this transition and he has my complete support,” said Hacala last week.
At the September 15 meeting which the board accepted Hacala's resignation, Fr. Edward Glynn, S.J. was appointed to be the chair of the Presidential Search Committee. The search committee will commence a national search for a president to succeed Hacala, and the committee, chaired by Glynn, will also be comprised of three other members of the board, one member from university administration, two members from university faculty, the president of the University's Alumni Council and one student, for a total of nine members.
Birge joined the university as executive vice president in July 2005, which ended a national search to fill the newly created position. He has been associated with two other Jesuit universities. Earlier in his career he worked at Regis University in Denver, Colo. as an administrator and part-time lecturer and he also earned his doctorate from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Wash.
Birge's wife, Lisa Schuler Birge, lived in Elm Grove as a child. Since her return to Wheeling, she has been active with the Wheeling Area Soccer Association coaching girl's soccer and has volunteered with the Ohio County United Way. They live in Wheeling with their three daughters, Caitlin, 15, Margaret, 10, and Siobhan, 8.
Prior to joining Wheeling Jesuit University, he and his family were residents of Camp Hill, Pa., where Birge was the executive director of the Pennsylvania Campus Compact, a statewide association of college and university presidents committed to the civic purposes of higher education. Before that, Birge was the coordinator of the Center for Service Learning at Regis University in Denver, Colo. from 1992-97. His early career was in the field of student affairs.
Birge is considered a higher education expert and maintains a scholarly interest in partnership development between higher education institutions, public scholarship, and the role of academic presidents as public leaders. He is the author of "The Aesthetical Basis for Service-Learning Practice,” published in Service-Learning in Higher Education: Critical Issues and Directions (Butin, 2005), coauthored, “Partnerships Among Colleges and Universities for Service-Learning,” which appeared in Building Partnerships for Service Learning (Jacoby, 2003) and “Beyond the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: Higher Education and Democracy,” in A Blueprint for Public Scholarship at Penn State (Cohen & Yapa, Eds., 2003).
He earned his undergraduate degree in education from Westfield State College in Massachusetts, his master's in education from Plymouth State University in New Hampshire and his doctorate in leadership studies from Gonzaga University in Washington. Birge's dissertation is entitled Academic Presidents as Public Leaders.
