In One Hundred Semesters, William Chace mixes incisive analysis with memoir to create an illuminating picture of the evolution of American higher education over the past half century. Chace follows his own journey from undergraduate education at Haverford College to teaching at Stillman, a traditionally African-American college in Alabama, in the 1960s, to his days as a professor at Stanford and his appointment as president of two very different institutions--Wesleyan University and Emory University.Chace takes us with him through his decades in education--his expulsion from college, his boredom and confusion as a graduate student during the Free Speech movement at Berkeley, and his involvement in three contentious cases at Stanford: on tenure, curriculum, and academic freedom. When readers follow Chace on his trip to jail after he joins Stillman students in a civil rights protest, it is clear that the ideas he presents are born of experience, not preached from an ivory tower.The book brings the reader into both the classroom and the administrative office, portraying the unique importance of the former and the peculiar rituals, rewards, and difficulties of the latter.Although Chace sees much to lament about American higher education--spiraling costs, increased consumerism, overly aggressive institutional self-promotion and marketing, the corruption of intercollegiate sports, and the melancholy state of the humanities--he finds more to praise. He points in particular to its strength and vitality, suggesting that this can be sustained if higher education remains true to its purpose: providing a humane and necessary education, inside the classroom and out, for America's future generations.

Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 Chapter 1: I Knew Exactly What I Was Doing 6 Chapter 2: Haverford--the Guilty Reminder 11 Chapter 3: And All Will Be Well 22 Chapter 4: The Readiness Is All 35 Chapter 5: Berkeley: Thoroughly Unready 47 Chapter 6: The Discipline of Literature 57 Chapter 7: A New Kind of Proletariat 69 Chapter 8: Going South 77 Chapter 9: Reading in Jail 88 Chapter 10: Poetry and Politics 97 Chapter 11: The Storehouse of Knowledge 110 Chapter 12: Unfolding the Origami of Teaching 121 Chapter 13: Tenure and Its Discontents 134 Chapter 14: Tenure Tested 143 Chapter 15: Teaching and Its Discontents 153 Chapter 16: The English Department in Disarray 165 Chapter 17: Why Join the Administration? 177 Chapter 18: Exchanging Reflection for Action 188 Chapter 19: Diversity University 198 Chapter 20: Marching to a Different Drummer 208 Chapter 21: The Puzzle of Leadership 222 Chapter 22: Looking at Success; Looking at Failure 240 Chapter 23: Learning and Then Leaving 252 Chapter 24: A School with Aspirations 270 Chapter 25: Being a Proprietor 287 Chapter 26: Real Power and Imaginary Power 306 Chapter 27: "A King of Infinite Space" 327 Index 339