McConnell, T. R. (Thomas Raymond), 1901-1989

Educator.

Educator, researcher, author, and university administrator.

Biography

Born in Mediapolis, Iowa in 1901, Thomas Raymond McConnell received his B.A. in English in 1924 from Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa and his Ph.D. in Educational Psychology in 1933 from the University of Iowa. He taught at Cornell College from 1925 to 1932 and served as a Dean from 1932 to 1936. McConnell was a Professor of Educational Psychology and Higher Education at the University of Minnesota from 1936 to 1950, receiving the L.L.D. in 1949. He served as Chancellor at the University of Buffalo from 1950 to 1954, receiving a D.H.L. from Syracuse University in 1952. During this period, Dr. McConnell established guidelines and articulated a philosophy for general education requirements and the value of a "liberal arts" education.

Dr. McConnell came to California in 1954 to serve as chief consultant for the Restudy of the Needs of California in Higher Education, many parts of which formed the basis of the 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education in California. In 1956, he founded the University's Center for the Study of Higher Education, which in 1965 under his chairmanship, became a national resource for research and information as the Center for Research and Development in Higher Education.

Thomas R. McConnell served on presidential commissions under Presidents Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson. Among other appointments, he was a member of the Advisory Committee of the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, the Subcommittee on Master Planning of the American Association of University Professors, the Subcommittee on Management and Financing of Colleges of the Committee for Economic Development, and the International Council for Educational Development.

Throughout his long career as an educator, researcher, author, and university administrator, Dr. McConnell was concerned with many issues in education, ranging from problems of academic leadership and the degree of faculty and student participation in the governance of higher education to the question of access to higher education and the concept of the "elite" university.