Bryn Mawr College President Kimberly Wright Cassidy

Jeff Blumenthal
Reporter- Philadelphia Business Journal

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Bryn Mawr College said Wednesday that Kimberly Wright Cassidy has been named the school’s ninth president, effective immediately.

Wright had been serving as interim president since last July, replacing Jane McAuliffe, who stepped down in June after five years in the role.

Before her interim appointment, Cassidy was the college’s provost for six years. She has a scholarly background in psychology, earning a master’s degree and Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and a bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore College in that subject. She has been a member of the Bryn Mawr faculty since 1993 and had chaired the psychology department before becoming provost.

Arlene Joy Gibson, chair of Bryn Mawr College’s board of trustees said since joining the faculty more than 20 years ago, Cassidy “has distinguished herself as a strategic and forward-thinking leader, an open and effective communicator, and a tremendously positive agent of change. She has deep experience across all aspects of learning and higher education, and truly embodies the core tenets of Bryn Mawr — scholarship, academic excellence and service to the community.”

Founded in 1885, Bryn Mawr College is a liberal arts school with roughly 1,300 undergraduate female students and 400 coed graduate students. Its notable alumnae includes legendary actress Katharine Hepburn, Nobel Peace Prize winner Emily Greene Balch, economist Alice Rivlin and Drew Gilpin Faust, the first woman president of Harvard University.

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