UVA provost to leave for Middlebury College presidency

Ian Baucom, UVA’s executive vice president and provost, will leave UVA in March to become president of Middlebury College in Vermont. Baucom’s tenure at UVA began in 2014 when he joined as dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, after 17 years as an English professor and administrator at Duke University. In 2022, he was named provost, UVA’s chief academic officer.

While at UVA, Baucom is credited with helping to hire 150 new faculty members and rolling out a curriculum focused on preparing undergraduate students for their future careers. Once Baucom leaves, Brie Gertler, UVA’s deputy provost and senior vice provost for academic affairs, will step in as interim executive vice president and provost until a replacement is named after a national search.

“I feel humbled and excited, incredibly grateful,” Baucom said of his appointment in an interview with Middlebury, where he’ll take the helm on July 1. “And I just cannot wait to get started.”

Other recent provosts have left to take on college presidencies, albeit briefly. Baucom replaced Liz Magill (Law class of ’95), who left to become president of the University of Pennsylvania. She resigned 18 months later amid criticism of her handling of campus protests after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel. She remains a law professor at Penn.

In 2019, Magill replaced former UVA provost Tom Katsouleas, who left UVA to become president of the University of Connecticut. He stepped down less than two years later after tensions with its governing board, local media reported, and he remains an engineering professor.