Professor donates to international studies

Prof. Gertrude Greenslate’s posthumous gift to the University generated about $386,000 for the University’s various international studies programs. Photo courtesy University Relations.

The Center for South Asian Studies and the East Asia Center, along with several other international studies programs, recently received more than $386,000 to strengthen and elevate their programs for the 2009-10 school year, thanks to late Economics Prof. Gertrude Greenslade.

Prior to her death in March 2007, Greenslade arranged to leave $9.8 million in an endowment to the University’s international studies programs. Now, those funds are beginning to be distributed to various University beneficiaries, College Dean Meredith Woo said, adding that the terms of the endowment mandate that only 5 percent may be distributed immediately.

The money also will contribute to exchange programs between the University and the University of Rome, École normale superiéure de Paris and École des hautes études en sciences sociales in Paris, Woo said.

“The College is using the money to expand its globalization effort in the next few years,” she said. “We have decided to invest in enriching our curriculum offerings in South and East Asia studies in preparation for becoming a national research centers in those areas.”

Gaining federal designation as a national research center would ensure federal funding for both the Center for South Asian Studies and the East Asia Center in the future, Woo explained. She said the decision to focus on South and East Asian programs was inspired by the President’s Commission on the Future of the University.

As a part of the Commission in 2006, the University’s Faculty Senate decided to endorse a movement toward internationalization by building internationally prominent research centers. The appropriation of nearly $400,000 to international studies programs is a manifestation of the Faculty Senate’s vision, Woo said.

As the College begins to use Greenslade’s gift to fund its international studies programs, members of the economics department also are remembering Greenslade fondly.

“She had a keen interest in understanding the strengths and weaknesses of centrally planned economic systems,” Economics Prof. Kenneth Elzinga said in an e-mail, adding that Greenslade’s particular research interest was the Soviet Union.

Prior to her arrival at the University, Greenslade was an employee of the Central Intelligence Agency for 15 years, beginning in 1954, Elzinga said.

“We knew Gertrude was highly regarded in the economic analysis side of intelligence work,” he added.

After leaving the University in 1993, Greenslade returned to the CIA, where she continued work as a consultant until her death.

Apart from her financial and professional legacy, Greenslade is remembered for her kind and unassuming personality.

“Gertrude was a congenial colleague and quiet and gracious to students,” Elzinga said. Greenslade also was one of the first women to receive her doctorate in economics from a prominent university — Johns Hopkins University — and only the second woman to be tenured in the College.