Alumnus William Plapinger Takes Office as Chair of Vassar College Board of Trustees

Poughkeepsie, NY — William A. Plapinger, a member of Vassar College's first fully co-educational freshman class, is the new Chair of the college's Board of Trustees. Plapinger has served since 2005 as Vice Chair of the Board, and in the past year also chaired the presidential search committee that selected Catharine Bond Hill to succeed Frances Fergusson as the tenth president of Vassar College. Hill, an economist and former provost of Williams College, began her presidency on July 1.

Plapinger succeeds Richard A. Van Demark, who completed a 10-year chairmanship and 23 years of service as a Vassar trustee on June 30.

"I am honored to have been selected to chair Vassar's board of trustees and look forward to continuing to work on behalf of this extraordinary institution," said Plapinger. "The college is indebted to my predecessor Richard Van Demark for his important leadership for so many years. With President Hill and my fellow trustees, we have the enviable opportunity to build on Frances Fergusson's 20 exceptional years of stewardship, and to help further Vassar's leading role in higher education."

Plapinger is the first Chair of the Vassar Board to reside outside the United States. He is the Coordinator of European Offices (comprising more than 100 lawyers in London, Paris and Frankfurt) of Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, a pre-eminent international law firm, and Managing Partner of its London office, the firm's largest branch office. He has an active client practice that focuses on securities, mergers and acquisitions and general corporate matters, with particular emphasis on complex, often precedent setting, international and U.S. financial transactions (in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, as well as the United States). His clients include industrial and financial companies, governments and investment banking firms. He has been located in London since 1987, following almost 10 years in the New York office of Sullivan & Cromwell.

Plapinger was an American Lawyer "Dealmaker of the Year" in 2000 and has been named by numerous publications, including Chambers, European Legal 500, Global Counsel, International Financial Law Review, PLC Which Lawyer? and Legal Business as, variously, one of the world's leading capital markets, international equities, IPO, M&A, and privatization lawyers.

Plapinger graduated cum laude from Vassar (with departmental honors in history) in 1974, earned his J.D. in 1978 from New York University School of Law, and also attended Westfield College, University of London, from 1972 to 1973.

Plapinger was originally elected a Vassar trustee in 1996 and has been re-elected twice to additional four-year term. He served as Chair of the Budget and Finance Committee from 1999 to 2005 and has also been a member of a number of other Board committees, including the Executive Committee. His other Vassar activities include serving as Special Gifts Co-chair of the Class of 1974 25th Reunion and as a member since 1991 of the Executive Committee of the Vassar Club of London. He also served on the college's Development Leadership Council from 1993 to 2000.

Among his other activities, Plapinger is also the senior member of the Board of Trustees of the 1,300-student (K-12) American School in London.

Plapinger is married to Kathleen ("Cassie") Murray, whose maternal grandmother, Julia Josephine Ellsworth, and her sister, Blanche E. Ellsworth, were members of the Vassar classes of 1917 and 1914, respectively. They have three children: Alexander, a 2006 graduate of Amherst College; Elizabeth, an incoming freshman at Vassar; and Thomas, a high school sophomore in London.

Consistently ranked as one of the best liberal arts colleges in the country, Vassar is renowned for groundbreaking achievements in education, for its long history of curricular innovation, and for the natural and architectural beauty of its campus. Its departments and multi-disciplinary programs range from cognitive science (the first at a U.S. liberal arts college), to classical studies, biochemistry, religion, and Africana studies. Vassar was among the earliest U.S. colleges to teach drama, psychology and Russian, and the first to be founded with an art gallery and teaching collection, which now spans over 16,000 works.

Vassar opened in 1861 as the first institution dedicated to providing young women with a complete higher education equal to the very best available to young men. The college began admitting men as transfers in 1969 and admitted its first co-educational freshman class in the fall of 1970. Today, it is a fully co-educational institution of approximately 2,400 students (currently 40% men and 60% women) who hail from 45 foreign nations and represent all 50 states. It has approximately 260 full-time faculty members and approximately 800 administrators, staff, and service employees, as well as more than 34,000 living alumnae and alumni.

Individuals with disabilities requiring accommodations or information on accessibility should contact Campus Activities Office at (845) 437-5370. Without sufficient notice, appropriate space and/or assistance may not be available.

Vassar College is a highly selective, coeducational, independent, residential liberal arts college founded in 1861.

This article was posted on Tuesday, August 15th, 2006.