UC Merced chancellor's hard work pays off

By Lorena Anderson
Modesto Bee

Editor's note: This story was first published in the Modesto Bee on August 31, 2005.

Even the briefest meeting with Carol Tomlinson-Keasey leaves no doubt: She knows where her talents lie, what she wants and how to get things done.

She'd better.

"There's no road map for this," said Rep. Dennis Cardoza, D-Merced. "They're building a university from scratch, and she's had to change the recipe a few times, too."

Living on five hours' sleep a night, working at her office in downtown Merced long after many other staff members have gone home, the chancellor of the University of California at Merced is getting ready to welcome the 1,000 students who make up the school's pioneer class.

She has been researching beginnings of other campuses and writing the speech she'll deliver to the students, families, community members and dignitaries who show up on Labor Day to help celebrate.

Although she has been chancellor for six years, the day classes start will be a beginning for her, too.

And a victory.

"I'm proud, but not surprised," Tomlinson-Keasey's daughter, Amber Peters, 32, said of her mother's success. "I always knew she could do anything she wanted."

The road to opening day has been long and sometimes bumpy, from site changes because of environmental concerns to funding problems that altered the university's opening date.

But Tomlinson-Keasey never doubted the school would live and breathe.

"That's just not the type of person I am, I suppose," she said.

AN ACHIEVER FROM THE BEGINNING

Here's a subject that probably interests the psychologist in Tomlinson-Keasey: Genetics vs. environment.

She is who she is because of both.

Tomlinson-Keasey probably inhabits the "gifted" category on any intelligence chart. She holds a Ph.D. in developmental psychology, is a licensed psychologist and a published author. She was a professor before she got into university administration, has been a lecturer at honors seminars and was named the University of California at Riverside's Distinguished Teacher of the Year for 1984-85.

She was born at Walter Reed Hospital, the military medical center in Washington, D.C., to an Army family. She attended grade school in Japan for a time and spent part of high school in France.

Tomlinson-Keasey's mother graduated from college, a relatively rare achievement at the time, then became a home economics teacher, Peters said.

And Tomlinson-Keasey's father, an electrical engineer, understood the challenges his daughter faced.

Her report cards featured comments from teachers such as, "Carol's very smart," Peters said. They also had comments including "Carol talks too much."

But there's another component to her mother's personality, Peters said: She grew up a tomboy with three brothers.

"That helped make her competitive and feisty," Peters said. "Anything they could do, she could do better.

"When she takes the time to do it, there's nothing she doesn't do well."

Tomlinson-Keasey is a list maker, Peters said, using legal pads to detail different obligations -- one for things to do at home, one for work and another at times when she was working on books or articles.

She's an expert baker of chocolate chip cookies, sewed a pretty pink dress for her daughter's eighth-grade graduation, ran a Girl Scout troop and shared in her children's school activities.

TRAVELING AND LEARNING

And education is in her blood.

Peters said she remembers going to the beach with her mother. Instead of sunbathing, they were off in the tide pools.