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| C. Edward Balog, Ph.D., President of Aquinas College |
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Dr. Balog came to Aquinas College in 2000 as Provost and Dean of Faculty, and Professor of History. He added Interim President to his list of duties in 2006, and then became the sixth president of the College in 2007.
He has implemented an aggressive and highly successful enrollment and retention plan; he presided over the opening of the Grace Hauenstein Library and celebrated its LEED Silver Certification by the U.S. Green Building Council; he oversaw the renovation of the second floor of the Academic Building into faculty offices, classrooms, and |
| student lounge areas; and was instrumental in the planning and oversight of building a 64-bed student apartment building on campus. Currently phase one of a two-phase renovation and addition to the existing field house is underway which will create a new Sports and Fitness Center that will benefit the athletic programs as well as the general wellness of the campus community. |
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| Under his leadership Aquinas became the first member of the Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference to install an artificial playing surface on its soccer field; was the first college in the country to offer an undergraduate degree in Sustainable Business; and was the first college in West Michigan to partner with Habitat for Humanity of Kent County to underwrite a LEED certified total gut rehab of a house in southwest Grand Rapids. |
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| Dr. Balog is a member of the American College and University Presidents' Climate Commitment Steering Committee and promoted the establishment of a Center for Sustainability on campus to implement sustainable business practices within the College's internal operations. The Center is a student-run, faculty-directed organization which collects and disseminates information, conducts conferences and workshops, and organizes sustainability initiatives on campus. |
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| The Science Initiative, a collaborative campaign of the Natural Sciences Department, the Nursing Department, the Mathematics Department, and the Advancement Department, was established under Dr. Balog's leadership in 2003. The Initiative has been successful in establishing support for scholarships and undergraduate research projects, support for maintaining and licensing research equipment, and funding for the purchase of scientific instrumentation to renovate and modernize classrooms and labs. |
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| With Dr. Balog's support, the College has implemented a Common Reading Experience for incoming freshmen that creates an immediate connection intellectually, socially, and philosophically with the greater community of faculty, staff, parents, and alumni. |
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| Building upon President Emeritus Norbert Hruby's vision for lifelong learning, Dr. Balog promoted the partnership between the Aquinas Emeritus College and the Osher Foundation to establish the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Aquinas College, part of a national network of lifelong learning institutes offering a broad range of intellectually stimulating, non-credit courses targeted toward the over-50 population. |
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| He has recently approved the "Fostering Success Scholarship" program at Aquinas which is awarded to two young adults each year who are aging out of the Michigan Foster Care System. The scholarship is designed to remove barriers to higher education by providing tuition, room, board, and books to its recipients. |
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| Dr. Balog and his wife, Catherine Logsdon, have four children: Melanie, Edward, Andrew, and Madeline. |
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