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Biography

William P. (Bill) Robinson assumed his duties as the 17th president of Whitworth University in Spokane, Washington, in July 1993. He came to Whitworth from Manchester College, in Indiana, where he served as president from 1986-93.

Much of Robinson's tenure at Whitworth has been devoted to his top priorities: serving students and strengthening the university's mission. In addition, he has initiated and expanded lines of communication with alumni, friends, and other constituencies of the university.

Whitworth maintains a very positive trajectory under Robinson's leadership. Over the past five years, freshman applications have increased from roughly 1,200 to more than 5,000, undergraduate enrollment has reached capacity, and, through steadily rising retention, the total student body has grown to 2,600. During Robinson's tenure, Whitworth has completed a number of capital projects, including its beautiful campus center, an athletics complex for soccer, softball and field events, expanded and renovated classroom/faculty-office buildings, and two academic buildings. Also, in both of the first two years of Christianity Today's national survey on the attitudes of employees at Christian organizations, Whitworth was named the best workplace in its category (colleges/universities/ seminaries).

A communications scholar who has distinguished himself as a teacher, speaker and community leader, Robinson received his bachelor's degree from the University of Northern Iowa, his master's degree from Wheaton College, and his Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh. He also studied at Princeton Theological Seminary and the Moody Bible Institute. Most of his scholarly work has focused on organizational, cross-cultural and interpersonal communication. He has also done informal research in undergraduate majors of religion and philosophy. In 2002, Robinson published a book, Leading People from the Middle: The Universal Mission of Mind and Heart, with Executive Excellence Publishing; his second book, Incarnate Leadership, will be released by Zondervan in February 2009.

Robinson is a past chair of the Spokane Regional Chamber of Commerce and a founding co-chair of the Higher Education Leadership Group of Spokane. He is the chair of the Independent Colleges of Washington, and he serves on the boards of Whitworth University, The Whitworth Foundation, Princeton Theological Seminary, the ING Educators Advisory Board, the Association of Presbyterian Colleges and Universities, the Spokane Regional Chamber of Commerce, the Spokane Symphony, and US Bank, Spokane/North Central Washington Region.

Born Sept. 30, 1949, in Elmhurst, Ill., Robinson has been married since 1974 to Bonnie Robinson, a classical pianist and organist who serves as principal organist for First Presbyterian Church of Spokane. The Robinsons have two daughters, Brenna and Bailley, and a son, Benjamin. Brenna, Whitworth Class of ’00, is associate pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church, in Boise, Idaho. Her husband, Alan Stanfield, '97, serves as a history teacher and as the head football coach at Boise’s Timberline High School. Brenna and Alan became first-time parents (and Bonnie and Bill became first-time grandparents) in summer 2008, when Asher Alan Stanfield was born. Ben graduated from Whitworth in 2003; after spending two-and-a-half years working with youth in an Anglican church in Cairo, Egypt, he is in his final year at Princeton Theological Seminary. Ben's wife, Emily (Hinson, '05), is employed as a nurse at a boys’ school in Princeton. Bailley is a 2006 graduate of Pepperdine University; she is now in an M.A. program in social work program at Washington University in St. Louis. In 2008 she married Whitworth alum Michael Wootton, ’04, who teaches school in St. Louis.

Whitworth students are accustomed to seeing Robinson among them, cheering at sporting events, enjoying plays and concerts on campus, chatting in residence-hall lounges, playing noontime hoops, and sharing meals and conversation in the dining hall. Both current students and alums mention how much they appreciate the fact that he knows them and cares about them. Robinson's connection with students is integral to his person and to his presidency. "My richest moments at Whitworth are the ones I share with students," he says. "My calling is to work with and for them."

Bill Robinson's e-mail address is wrobinson@whitworth.edu.