U.Va. president stepping down in 2010

University of Virginia President John T. Casteen III announced Friday that he will step down at the end of his 20th year on Aug. 1, 2010.

The Portsmouth native will become president emeritus at that time. He will then serve as a consultant to the new president for a year and will eventually return as a member of the faculty after a sabbatical.

"These years have been all but magical for my family and me," Casteen said. "We have had the pleasure of living and working among students, staff members, faculty members, alumni, other backers of the university, and the women and men of a community that we see as America's best."

As president, Casteen has been an advocate for increasing the number of women and minority students and students from low-income backgrounds. In 2003, he directed the formation of AccessUVa, the university's full-need financial aid program. Casteen is also known for his fundraising savvy and his drive to position U.Va. as one of the top public institutions in the country.

In 2005, U.Va. experienced a rash of racial incidents in which minority students were targets of slurs shouted from cars and scrawled on apartment and dorm doors.

According to newspaper articles, Casteen was at the center of the university's response: He made rare public speeches to demand that students, faculty and staff speak out publicly against the harassment and pushed campaigns such as having the community wear black ribbons in support of the minority students.

In recent years, the university and its schools have consistently earned high national rankings for educating and graduating minority students; the quality of undergraduate teaching; the value of their academic programs for the price; and success in weathering cuts in state funding.

On the global front, Casteen made the university a founding member of Universitas 21, an international network of 21 research-intensive universities in 14 countries.

He serves as chairman of the consortium.

"John Casteen will be remembered as the person who understood Jefferson's vision of this place and catapulted it into the 21st century," said W. Heywood Fralin, rector of the university's board of visitors.

"He will leave an indelible mark and will be remembered as the father of our modern university."

Casteen, 65, is among the country's longest-serving university presidents.

A Cradock High graduate, he went to U.Va. in 1961 at the age of 17 - the first in his family to attend college.

Casteen received bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees from U.Va., all in English. He later taught English at several universities, including his alma mater and Virginia Commonwealth University.

Beginning in 1975, he served as dean of admission at U.Va. and visited the homes of African American families across the state to assure them that their children had a place at the university, according to a news release.

He served as Virginia's secretary of education from 1982 to 1985 and was president of the University of Connecticut from 1985 until being appointed Virginia's seventh president in 1990.

Fralin noted several of Casteen's accomplishments: The president, he said, has overseen significant improvements in academic programs and the creation of a new school - the Batten School for Leadership and Public Policy. During his tenure, U.Va. has constructed 98 buildings, purchased 11, done major additions on 10, completed major renovations on six, and conducted extensive renovations in Thomas Jefferson's historic Academical Village.

Casteen was instrumental in the expansion of the university's College at Wise in order to serve more students from Southwest Virginia.

Old Dominion University President John Broderick knew of Casteen's record when Broderick lived in Connecticut during Casteen's tenure as president there.

His reputation has only grown in Virginia, Broderick said Friday.

"Since I've been in Virginia, his leadership, not only at the University of Virginia but in higher education, has been something exemplary in my mind," Broderick said.

The board of visitors is expected to begin the search for a new president in late July. Meanwhile, Casteen said, he and his wife will be busy with the upcoming weddings of two of their daughters. The Casteens have five children and two grandchildren.

Denise Watson Batts, (757) 446-2504, denise.batts@pilotonline.com