She tugs on her blouse, tousles her hair and takes off her glasses for a photo. She banters at situations in which most would remain frustrated, like getting chauffeured by a man in a golf cart who can’t find his way around construction on campus.
He almost drove around in circles. “Well, you showed me around a little bit,” she said.
Jane Close Conoley, who began her duties at The Beach on July 15, is the shy, yet sassy, person who holds the most powerful position on campus – university president.
Conoley made her first public appearance on campus Friday during an education summit with newly elected Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia.
She met with him Monday around 1 p.m. at the Chartroom to further discuss his ties with CSULB. She said he spoke about “university preschool” and “internship provision” and possibly teaching a course at CSULB for students interested in politics.
Given her background in psychology, Conoley plans to provide adequate resources to better the performance and opportunities for students at CSULB.
Before she moved to The Beach, Conoley served as dean and professor of counseling at the Clinical and School Psychology: Gevirtz Graduate School of Education, University of California, Santa Barbara.
Conoley said that changing the colors of her accessories from UCSB’s blue and gold to CSULB’s black and gold will be easy.
“Now I just have to put in the black, but I have to throw away the blue,” she said.
Her background may explain why she believes that those in charge can’t make a plan until they know what’s happening. She said she wants to familiarize herself with different programs on campus before making the right decisions.
“[Student success] is my absolute top priority, to add to that — the momentum,” she said. “There’s a lot of strategy and a lot of work being done on student success initiatives. We’re all over the board. There [are] different students that need specifically different things.”
She said she wants to find ways to generate money for CSULB, such as seeking private donors or foundations for gifts to the university — although, there is no set goal. She said that other California institutions such as the University of California have done so.
On Monday, assistant director of media relations Kenneth Swisher gave Conoley her first tour of the CSULB in what she called, “the Cadillac of golf carts.” Like students, Conoley stopped by the University Bookstore to get a campus identification card.
“Have I fluffed up enough?” she asked about her hair. “It’s Ken’s fault for all the wind, getting nowhere.”
After receiving her identification card, gifts and warm welcomes from Bookstore employees, Conoley was taken to see the free speech lawn and the Prospector Pete sculpture, located near the Liberal Arts 5 and Faculty Office 3 buildings.
Swisher then brought Conoley to CSULB’s newest sculpture, “MatterApp: Pyramidial,” a 20 feet high art piece that was illuminated to the public in June. There, curator of exhibitions Kristina Newhouse, among other art department and University Art Museum leaders, invited Conoley to contribute to the sculpture.
Newhouse handed Conoley a bag of mostly string-like material. She chose a red and black polyester fabric and began weaving it through the sculpture.
Conoley visited the Walter Pyramid soon after, where was greeted by Pat West, the secretary of the 49er Athletic Association. West escorted Conoley and Swisher to the trophy room, where they found Long beach state volleyball head coach Brian Gimmillaro pep-talking a group young female volleyball players not from CSULB.
After the tour, Conoley returned to her office at around 3:10 p.m. It is bare, with only a few folders of paperwork, flowers left on a table near a corner and blue post-it notes on the walls that read, “Paint.”
Likewise, Conoley said the Miller House — the home she is given as president during her service at CSULB — is under maintenance to replace 30-year-old appliances, an air conditioning system and the roof. In the meantime, Conoley said that she has been staying at the Hilton Hotel Conoon Ocean Boulevard.