Trustee praises vision, energy Harold T. Shapiro, president of Princeton since 1988 and one of the most respected leaders in American higher education for more than two decades, will complete his presidency next summer, after the end of the current academic year. Shapiro announced his plans to the University's trustees Sept. 22 at their regularly scheduled meeting. "Thanks to his vision, his sensitivity to the concerns of everyone in the Princeton family, and his unlimited energy, Harold Shapiro has provided extraordinary leadership for Princeton over these past 12 years -- strengthening its faculty and its student body, enhancing its programs of teaching and research, revitalizing its campus and dramatically increasing its endowment," said Robert Rawson Jr., chair of the board's executive committee. "He also has served with great distinction in a number of major leadership roles outside of Princeton, while also finding time to teach both undergraduate and graduate students," he continued. "We will be sorry to see his presidency come to an end, but we are deeply grateful to Harold, and to his wife, Vivian, for their many contributions to Princeton, and we look forward to their continuing participation in the life of this campus and this community for many years to come." Shapiro said he had been mulling over the decision to step down as president for some time. "I was somewhat conscious of the fact that I reached my 65th birthday last June, and that there were many things I still wanted to do in my teaching and research," he told reporters at a news conference. "I wanted to make sure I left time to get those done." Shapiro will return to full-time teaching and research in the Department of Economics and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, where he has held a joint appointment. He expects to take a sabbatical leave next year to develop his plans, and could return to the classroom as early as the spring semester of 2001. "In recent years, I've been teaching in the area of bioethics," he said. "I will expect to continue doing that, or perhaps (work in) other areas of public policy." A native of Canada, Shapiro received his Ph.D. in economics from Princeton in 1964. He returned as Princeton's 18th president in 1988 after serving for eight years as the president of the University of Michigan. As a national leader, Shapiro is the only president to have been listed by Change magazine among the most influential university presidents in both the 1980s and the 1990s. He has served two U.S. presidents: George Bush as a member and vice chair (1992-93) of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology; and Bill Clinton as chair, since 1996, of the National Bioethics Advisory Commission. He also has served on many other federal and state panels. Last spring, the Council of Scientific Society Presidents awarded Shapiro its 2000 Leadership Citation for "stellar leadership toward resolution of the most complex ethical issues, created by frontier life sciences research." Within the higher education community, Shapiro has chaired the boards of the Association of American Universities and the Consortium on Financing Higher Education, and has served on the boards of the American Council on Education and other organizations. He also chairs the board of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation; co-chairs New Jersey's Edison Partnership; and serves on a number of other boards, including those of the Educational Testing Service, the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center, the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and the National Collegiate Athletic Association, where he serves on the executive committee. Shapiro has received 14 honorary degrees, including, most recently, an honorary degree (along with his twin brother, Bernard, principal and vice chancellor of McGill University in Montreal) from the University of Edinburgh, the alma mater of two of Princeton's most distinguished presidents, John Witherspoon and James McCosh. A member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, Shapiro is also a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the College of Physicians of Philadelphia.  Related articles Shapiro to step down at the top of his game Search for successor begins		[an error occurred while processing this directive]