Last December, Associate Dean of Students Neil Gerard announced his retirement following 18 years of quiet but influential work. During his tenure, Gerard helped transform the college’s student activities and campus life into what it is today.

Gerard described his decision to retire as two-fold. “On the personal side, I’m at a point where I’m looking to slow down a bit and not work 70 to 80 hours a week,” he said. “I combine that with the professional view that it’s time for someone else to take the lead—someone who hopefully will have the next 10-year horizon.”

The college hired Gerard in 1993 to oversee the creation of “a campus center worthy of Pomona College,” as called for in then-Pomona President Peter Stanley’s inaugural address. This center would replace the pre-existing heavy concrete and stucco building known as the Edmunds Union.

“It was a bunker with dark hallways and pretty foreboding appearance,” Gerard said. At the time, he explained, one small committee of students ran all social programming, and five fraternities were grumbling after changes to the college’s alcohol policy.

“I’ve had this breadth of experience, but probably the long-lasting impact is seen in the campus center,” Gerard said. When the building opened in 1999, “students were not thrilled… it wasn’t functional,” Gerard recounted. In the years that followed, Gerard worked with students, staff, and administrators to improve the Smith Campus Center, culminating in the 2006 renovation that created the living room, Doms Lounge, the student art gallery, and the current spaces for the Coop Fountain and Coop Store.

“We got it right,” Gerard said, “and that [transformation] is one of the things I feel proudest about.”

Since his first day at Pomona, Gerard has actively involved himself with student activities. He has been the ASPC Senate staff advisor for his entire career, and he helped develop ASPC’s Committee for Campus Life and Activities (CCLA) into a “diversified, vibrant organization.”

“Neil is irreplaceable. He has been an incredible resource, friend, and mentor to students, and the ASPC would not be the same without him,” said current ASPC President Stephanie Almeida PO ’11. Gerard has also served as advisor to the International Student Mentoring Program, the Mortar Board, the Jewish Student Union, and Challah for Hunger.

In addition to serving as Director of the Smith Campus Center and Associate Dean of Students, he is the Director of Bridges Auditorium and chair of the Distinguished Speaker Committee, which has brought David Plouffe, Sandra Day O’Connor, and Van Jones to campus in recent years.

A committee of staff, faculty, and students, including Almeida and ASPC Vice President Cosi Thawley PO ’11, has just begun the search for his replacement.