Averett University president looks back at tenure

By Denice Thibodeau

Published: May 5, 2008

Richard Pfau has completed his sixth and final year as Averett University’s president, and plans to retire to a small town in upstate New York.
At Averett’s graduation ceremony on Saturday, Pfau looked at the smiling students lining up to walk across the stage and said, “I will miss this. It’s the 20th commencement at which I have conferred degrees — 12 here and eight at my former institution.
“There’s a special pride in what the students have done; pleasure that they’re moving on and, like them, I am moving on. I’m commencing also.”
He said he and his wife of almost 44 years, Nancy, purchased a home two years ago in Sharon Springs, N.Y., in anticipation of his retirement.
“We’re going back to New York, where my wife’s family’s roots go back 250 years, back where she went to high school,” Pfau said. “We’re going back to a place where everybody knows her.”
He said the town has 549 residents, then chuckled and corrected himself, saying, “It’s 547 until we get there.”
Pfau said the home they purchased has family history, and that his wife celebrated her first birthday in the home.
He plans to get a John Deere tractor to mow the lawn, and said he is looking at a number of things to keep him busy.
“There’s so much you can do now electronically,” Pfau said. “I’ve got several possible options, possibly teaching, possibly other things in higher education.”
While Pfau’s tenure as Averett’s president has included increased enrollment, expanded academic programs and campus expansion, it has not been without controversy, including a break in the 150-year-long ties with the Baptist General Association of Virginia.
The break was caused by several events on campus, including a 2003 visit by a retired Episcopal bishop who criticized a literal interpretation of the Bible, and student involvement in Gay Pride Week activities in 2004.
Pfau announced he was retiring last October and a search committee was formed to seek a replacement. The name of that person will be announced at 11 a.m. Wednesday on the front steps of Main Hall at the Averett campus.
Pfau said he will stay until the new president can assume leadership of the university this summer.
Denice Thibodeau at or (434) 791-7985.