Former Fed Vice Chairman Tapped To Lead Harvard Overseers

Roger W. Ferguson Jr. ’73, former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, has been selected as the president of the University’s Board of Overseers, Harvard’s second-highest governing body, for the 2008-2009 school year, school officials announced last week.

Ferguson, who will serve as president in the final year of his six-year term as an overseer, will succeed Frances D. Fergusson ’66 after Commencement in June.

William F. Lee ’72, the outgoing vice chair of the board’s executive committee, said that Ferguson and the board’s biggest task for the upcoming term would be to aid University President Drew G. Faust during her first years in office.

“I think that for the board right now, the single biggest focus is to work with Drew as she shapes her presidency and to fully support her initiatives,” Lee said. “It’s most important to come together on important issues, and to give Drew the benefit of our collective thinking.”

Ferguson, who has been a member of the board’s executive committee since 2006, has had a long history in both the public and private sector. From 1999 to 2006, he served as the vice chairman of the Board of Governors of the U.S. Federal Reserve System.

Following his time in government, Ferguson, who also holds both a law degree and a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard, became the chairman of Swiss Re American Holding Corp., a leading reinsurance company.

The University also announced that Pauline Yu ’71, president of the American Council of Learned Studies and former dean of the humanities at the University of California, Los Angeles, would succeed Lee as the vice chair of the board’s executive committee.

In a statement, Faust praised the experience and fresh views that both Ferguson and Yu will bring to their positions.

“Our Overseers together contribute an extraordinary breadth of perspective and experience to the work of the University, and both Roger Ferguson and Pauline Yu carry out their board responsibilities with a remarkable measure of wisdom and devotion,” Faust said. “I look forward to working with them closely, and benefiting further from their excellent counsel, during their time as senior officers of the board.”