Outlook Magazine - Fall 2020

ON CAMPUS

K atherine P. Frank, who loves to travel, has seen and experienced much of the U.S. in her life and career. She was born in North Carolina and grew up in Colorado. She went back east to Maine for her undergraduate degree and far west to Washington for her master’s and Ph.D., all in English. Then came teaching and higher education administrative jobs in Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky and most recently at Central Washington University. At age 48 with a wealth of experience and an opportunity to lead, she has landed in northwest Wisconsin. On March 1, she became the eighth and first female leader in UW-Stout’s 129-year history. It isn’t just a new place and role for Frank. It’s a new type of institution for her, a polytechnic, where the liberal arts education on which she grounded her career is the foundation of an applied learning model. The opportunity seemed like a perfect fit, however, to Frank as she moved through the UW System search process. She read and researched everything she could to see what made UW-Stout special. In that mix of liberal arts and applied learning, she “fell in love with Stout. I connected with the institution immediately,” she said. “Ours is a community that focuses on and models innovation and problem-solving. This approach to learning is one of the many things that drew me to the institution.” Frank is committed to moving UW-Stout forward while drawing from its rich past. “Each day I am on campus, I look out of my office window at the Clock Tower, hear the bell chimes and pass by the portrait of James Huff Stout in the Chancellor’s Conference Room. I am reminded of the history of the institution and the unique approach to education introduced by our founder in 1891 when Stout Manual Training School opened,” Frank said. “We are focused, first and foremost, on student success. The journey into, through and beyond our institution matters. These fundamentals remain at the core of my daily decision-making process.”

NEWPLACE, NEWKIND OF CHALLENGE Chancellor Frank was and is drawn to UW-Stout’s applied learning approach, is dedicated to its future

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