Ursinus President will resign June 30

Ursinus College President John Strassburger will resign effective June 30 for personal and health reasons after 16 years at the helm of the Collegeville school, officials said this afternoon.

Strassburger, 67, announced his plans to a campus gathering of more than 350 students, faculty and staff today in Bomberger auditorium.

"With truly bittersweet feelings of both anticipation and regret, I have decided the time is right for my family and for me, personally and for health reasons, and right for Ursinus as well, for me to step down," Strassburger said in a prepared statement. "I am proud to say that the college has never been stronger or more secure in its identity."

A recent re-accreditation report from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education declared Ursinus to be a "model of liberal education."

Strassburger will remain on for two years as president emeritus to assist with the transition.

The college plans to launch a national search for a successor.

"Owing to President Strassburger's extraordinary leadership, and his role in Ursinus emerging as a national leader among liberal arts colleges, we are confident that Ursinus could hardly be in a better position to select the next great leader in liberal education," board chairman Spencer Foreman said in a prepared statement.

The 10-year re-accreditation report highlighted the school's new programs from dance to neuroscience, its "Common Intellectual Experience" course for freshmen, independent learning requirement and the growth in international study and undergraduate research.