| Clayton Spencer was elected by the Bates
College Board of Trustees as the eighth president of Bates College.
She took office on July 1, 2012. Clayton came to Bates from Harvard
University, where she spent more than 15 years on the leadership
team. Since 2005, Clayton served as Harvard’s Vice President
for Policy. In that capacity she played a key role in a reshaping
and major expansion of Harvard’s financial aid program. Also
at Harvard, Clayton served concurrently as executive dean of the
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study and as a lecturer at
Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, teaching courses on
federal higher education policy. As former Chief Education Counsel
to the U.S. Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources, Clayton
was responsible for staffing for the late U.S. Senator Edward M.
Kennedy in his capacity as chairman and then ranking member of the
committee. She managed the committee’s education staff and
directed the legislative process for education legislation and
policy, including federal student aid, science and research policy,
the education budget, and technology in education. Previously she
clerked for Judge Rya W. Zobel of the U.S. District Court in
Massachusetts, practiced law at Ropes & Gray in Boston, and
then served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Boston, prosecuting
criminal cases. She earned a J.D. from Yale in 1985. While at Yale
Law School, Spencer was an editor of the Yale Law Journal, winner
of the Moot Court competition, and chair of the Public Interest
Council. Clayton received a bachelor’s degree from Williams
College in 1977, magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, with highest
honors in History and German. Also, while she might never claim a
strong athletic profile, Clayton did play varsity basketball for
the Ephs. She then earned a B.A. in theology from Oxford in 1979 as
recipient of the Carroll A. Wilson Fellowship, awarded by Williams.
She received a Master of Arts degree in the study of religion from
Harvard in 1982. Clayton has served as a trustee of Williams
College and Phillips Exeter Academy and has lectured and written on
higher education issues. In 1997, she received a Bicentennial Medal
for achievement in the field of education policy from Williams
College. But in the space of one year Clayton has fully become a
Bobcat, and demonstrated a strong commitment to Bates athletics.
Whether it was heading out to the 50-yard line for the football
coin toss, roaring with the crowd in Alumni Gymnasium, bundling up
for the [ski teams'] Bates Carnival, riding along with the rowers
in the coaching boat at the CBB Regatta, or serving as a faculty
liaison to the Men’s Basketball team, Clayton has already put
her stamp on Bates Athletics. |
Bates College President Clayton Spencer accepted induction into
the Bates Scholar-Athlete Society before delivering the ceremony's
keynote address. Photo by Jose Leiva.
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