Campus & Community

Rinere appointed advising dean of Harvard College

4 min read
Monique
Monique Rinere

Monique Rinere, dean of Butler College at Princeton University, has been named associate dean of advising programs for Harvard College, effective Feb. 27. In this newly created position, the associate dean will coordinate, manage, and monitor the academic advising systems for all undergraduates.

“I am very pleased that Monique Rinere will take on this new and exciting position,” said Benedict H. Gross, dean of Harvard College and Leverett Professor of Mathematics. “Few institutions in the country have the advising resources found here at Harvard. Students have access to advisers in practically every aspect of their college career. What we would like to do better is coordinate the disparate advising resources available to students. Given her very strong background as an adviser at Princeton and other institutions, Monique is ideally suited to not only manage advising programs here, but to significantly improve advising for students.”

“Advising is one of the key components of our review of undergraduate education. Monique Rinere’s appointment, which grew out of one of the major recommendations of the Committee on Advising and Counseling, fills a much needed role in our advising system,” said William C. Kirby, dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and Edith and Benjamin Geisinger Professor of History. “I am delighted to have her on board, and look forward to working with her as we move forward in our efforts to more fully engage the faculty in the very important activity of advising undergraduates.”

Rinere comes to Harvard at a time when undergraduate advising is the focus of considerable attention. In a Dec. 8 Faculty of Arts and Sciences faculty meeting, at which Gross announced Rinere’s appointment, the Committee on Advising and Counseling recommended sweeping changes in advising at Harvard College, including enthusiastic support for the associate dean of advising programs position.

As associate dean, Rinere will work with academic deans, associate deans in the College, department chairs, and resident deans “to establish an effective concentration advising system.” Working with the Freshman Dean’s Office, she will coordinate the work of proctors, nonresident advisers, tutors, directors of undergraduate study, and peer student advisers. The associate dean will also develop plans to increase the number of academic advisers, including faculty, for freshmen.

“I am thrilled to be joining Harvard to work on the advising programs, especially at this time of immense positive change,” Rinere said. “It’s a fabulous opportunity to work together with incredibly talented students, faculty, and administrators on this essential component of undergraduate education.”

As a residential college dean at Princeton (since 2001), Rinere is involved with almost every aspect of advising and academic support for students in the university’s Butler College. In addition to managing academic advising and implementation of academic regulations for some 500 freshmen and sophomores, she advises students facing academic problems, works closely with faculty advisers to monitor course selection and academic progress, and works with the Undergraduate Student Government on faculty advising issues. Further, she recruits and trains peer advisers, and recruits and cultivates relationships with faculty advisers.

Prior to her position at Princeton, Rinere was Education Consultant at Ernst & Young LLP, where she managed teams of people who developed instructor-led training, print publications, and Web-based courses on globalization and cross-cultural communication.

From 1998 to 2000, Rinere was director of Global Training and Development at Training Management Corp. (TMC) in Princeton. In that role, among other things, she worked with and counseled college students on graduate school and career options in an intern program she created.

Rinere, who has a Ph.D. in Germanic languages and literatures from Princeton, and a B.A. in German and Music from City University of New York, Hunter College, has taught German as well as courses on German literature and culture. She has also translated and edited numerous books and papers.