Pollard Named JBU President

Charles W. Pollard of Grand Rapids, Mich., was named the sixth president of John Brown University on April 3. Pollard will take over his new job on July 1. He replaces Lee Balzer, who had been president since 1994.

The first three presidents of JBU were three generations of the Brown family: John E. Brown, the founder; John Brown Jr. and John Brown III. George Ford served as president for 10 months before Balzer took the job.

Since 1997, Pollard has worked at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, where he was a tenured faculty member.

Pollard earned a bachelor’s degree from Wheaton College in Illinois in 1985, a juris doctorate from Harvard Law School in 1988, a masters in English from Oxford University in 1990 and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Virginia in 1999.

Pollard worked as a lawyer for the firm of Latham & Watkins in Chicago where his corporate clients included Marriott International Inc., Citicorp and Sears.