a snapshot of Bard more than a half century ago, from the mid 1960s: Stuart Levine (7), the only full time coach Charlie Patrick (13) the faculty advisor, philosophy teacher William (Bill) Lensing (in the coat and tie), Hilton Weiss (a young faculty member in Chemistry) (9), Terry Dewsnap, (a young faculty member in Literature), Stan Reichel (6) an alumnus and now trustee and George Hayward (12), then director of admissions.
Leon Botstein’s message to the Bard Community on May 2, 2020:
It is with sadness and regret that I inform the Bard community of the death of Stuart Stritzler-Levine, professor emeritus of psychology and dean emeritus of the college. Stuart died last night at Vassar Brothers Hospital at the age of 87 from a non-COVID-related massive heart attack.
Stuart joined the faculty at Bard in 1964. He received his B.A. from New York University, M.A. from New School University, and Ph.D. from SUNY Albany. Prior to his arrival at Bard, he was a clinical research psychologist at Philadelphia State Hospital, where he worked in a National Institute of Mental Health project designed to rehabilitate patients with chronic mental illness. He also served as a clinical psychologist at Bordentown Reformatory. His teaching and research interests at Bard included social psychology, specifically obedience to authority, conformity, attitude measurement, and change; moral development; and experimental design. He was fascinated by the work of Stanley Milgram and contemporary theories of moral development. For decades he taught the required statistics course in the Social Studies Division. He was legendary as a Senior Project adviser.
Stuart was Dean of the College from 1980 to 2001. In those 21 years he oversaw innovations in the admission process, particularly the Immediate Decision Plan; the rapid growth of Bard’s enrollment and curriculum; and the college’s expansion into graduate education. He served as Dean of Studies at Bard High School Early College Manhattan from 2003 to 2009, then returned to teaching at Bard and at Simon’s Rock. He died, not retired, but in active service, as was his dream.
No one has worked as tirelessly and generously for Bard as Stuart did. He loved the college, its mission, its people, its history, and its landscape. He was fastidious and disciplined; yet he made the time not only to work unstintingly, but also to sit and talk with everyone, anytime. He was a natural enthusiast. His passions included sports (he coached the basketball team for several years), fishing in Michigan, operas by Richard Wagner, and the photography of Berenice Abbott. It will be hard for many of us who worked closely with Stuart to imagine the college without him. His fondest wish was that Bard, to which he devoted 56 years of continuous service, would flourish.
Stuart is survived by his wife, Nina Stritzler-Levine, Gallery Director/Director of Curatorial Studies at the Bard Graduate Center; and two daughters, Alyssa (“Ali”), Simon’s Rock ’15, and Jennifer. A third daughter, Jessica ’84, died in 2010.
A private burial will take place tomorrow in the Bard College Cemetery. A public memorial will be held in the fall, at the discretion of the family and when COVID-19 restrictions permit it.
Messages from members of the Bard Community:
Frank Scalzo shared these words with the Division of Science, Mathematics, and Computing:
Many of us knew Stuart as the dean who hired us, a colleague who provided guidance, support and perhaps a bit of frustration at times. As I reflect on my interactions with Stuart over the past 22 years there are too many anecdotes to share at this time.
I had the privilege of getting to know Stuart as the dean, as a mentor, advisor, colleague, and as a fellow fisherman on the waters of Lake Michigan. It was during those times on the lake, whether it be at predawn hours to enjoy the sunrise together or at dusk to make one more attempt to land a lake trout or salmon from his vintage wooden boat, the Balamina.
So, however you remember Stuart or “Stu” as the guys at the marina called him, know that he loved his family, his work and his students, and he loved to fish. My fondest memories of Stu will be from those calm-water times on the lake where he seemed to be most content. This photo is a warm reminder of one of those days, I don’t remember if we caught any fish that day but as he would say “it’s about the process”.
On very windy days with 3 foot or greater swells that prohibited fishing, we would have time to contemplate the impact of various independent variables on dependent variables, whether they be related to fish or human behavior, and how to analyze their effects, and we would hope for less wind and calmer waters the next day.
I now ask you to take a 30 sec pause to reflect on your memories of Stuart, and for those of you who did not know him, perhaps you can take this time to reflect on your lives and the privilege we have to work together as colleagues and as Stuart so very much cherished, the privilege we have to work with our remarkable students, and remember that for all of us, calm waters will follow.
Valery Monakhov and Philip Fedchin, on behalf of our colleagues at Smolny College:
We are deeply saddened by the news of the death of the dean and professor emeritus of Bard College, Stuart Stritzler-Levine. Professor Levin made an outstanding contribution not only to the activities of Bard College, but also had a significant impact on the creation and formation of international educational programs.
Some of us, who, by the will of fate, were among the initiators and organizers of Bard College’s educational programs in St. Petersburg, were fortunate enough to meet Dean Levin in October 1990, at the very height of his career as the dean of the college. Not only the professional achievements of professor Levin, but also his personality aroused not only unlimited respect for this man but also interest in what seemed to many people as just a “university routine” — but whose constant rethinking allows the university to remain a living and developing organism. His stories about college and what he had to do and managed to do as a dean made such a strong and positive impression that they became one of the factors that strengthened our confidence that the educational model of liberal arts and sciences can be developed and will be in demand in the Russian higher education.
Subsequently, when the project to create and develop the Smolny College of Liberal Arts and Sciences began, Stuart made significant efforts to transfer the experience of organizing educational activities based on the most modern innovative approaches to his Russian colleagues. Professor Levin repeatedly visited St. Petersburg, got acquainted with the first steps of Smolny College, generously shared his knowledge, and with great dedication and exceptional delicacy helped the first generation of Smolny teachers to form a new institutional culture. At some point, Stuart had the idea to settle in Finland at the end of his deanship at Bard and to work at Smolny. Unfortunately for us, this idea could not be implemented.
Today, when Professor Stuart Levin left this world, we feel especially sharply and understand even better how much he meant to all of us and how much he managed to do for the future of our world, the development of unique joint US-Russian educational programs, good human relations between representatives of different peoples and cultures.
Sharing the feeling of loss, we grieve with you. The memory of a wonderful and bright man, such as Stuart Levin, will forever remain in the hearts of those who knew him.
Please convey our deepest condolences to the family and friends of the deceased.
I knew Stuart Levine mostly as my Dean, the fellow who gave me the job with a phone call, as he did for so many of us. Every now and then I had a chance to glimpse the fair-minded, kind-hearted man beneath the administrative facade, and once in a crisis he treated me with great empathy. I found that generosity was his default mode. My respect for him grew over the years, and I enjoyed the occasional conversation with him as colleague rather than Dean. Once I was eating alone in the late, lamented Millhouse Panda restaurant and he came and sat at the table next to me – alone with his daughter, then still a young girl. The tenderness he showed toward her was touching, and I’ve never forgotten it.
-Kyle Gann
I am deeply saddened by the passing of Stuart Levine. How many times have I opened my email at both Bard and Simon’s Rock to see a note of encouragement or thanks or congratulations from Stuart. I know how much he loved Bard, but I also know how fond he was of Simon’s Rock, and what a champion he was for Bard’s far-reaching progressive mission. This was truly a lovely, special human being, someone you always kind of counted on being there, and who showed himself to be there, and for so many, just when you least expected it. I just had an email from him this past Wednesday, a note of encouragement and thanks, and while I always answered him as quickly as I could, circumstances prevented me from getting to that one. That will only help me to think of him the more in the days and years ahead, as I know I will.
-Peter Filkins
I moderated in government in the early 70s. My board insisted that I take a statistics class, which I did with Stuart Levine. Not my favorite subject, but I loved the data set – Stuart’s summer catch of lake trout, which as an avid fisherman myself made me jealous of the quantity, length, width, weight, and every other measure of Stuart’s success.
He gave me a set of his lures, which I still have. Over the following almost half century, I’ve given him lures too, including a small one that worked for me recently, made by someone on a 3-D printer in the Pacific Northwest. It was smaller than most, and Stuart then articulated a theory: the smaller the lure, the bigger the fish. I was looking forward to hearing whether he had success field testing that theory.
Stuart and I spoke frequently over the years, often about hate, especially given his expertise about Stanley Milgram. Stuart was always fascinated with the world around him, and how to think about it. He was an eager supporter of the Center for Hate Studies (he and I had brainstormed about this idea for years), and a regular participant in the faculty reading group on hate. He even attended a meeting the night of his 87th birthday. I told him it would be fine if he missed a session and celebrated this milestone rather than discuss whatever disturbing text the group was dissecting. He insisted on coming. His faculty colleagues enjoyed celebrating his birthday with him (yes, we also had cake), and he had a good time that evening, talking about ideas that mattered to him.
The last faculty reading group was on Zoom on April 20 (reading Primo Levi, especially appropriate on Hitler’s birthday). Before jumping into the text, we all shared how we were coping with the new world. Stuart expanded on what he had written to me a few days before: “I am learning how to teach on-line but have to admit it is not my favorite thing to do and I miss my regular life.” Stuart clearly missed his routine, and his in-person connection with his students and colleagues.
Stuart could also be tenacious about questions that intrigued him. When he heard I was bringing Maggie Paxson to Bard (scheduled for last month, now postponed) to speak about her book, The Plateau, he was not only excited, but determined. He wanted her to stay over and speak with his class. And he was eager to bring his friend Francois Rochat to Bard at the same time. Both had chronicled this region in France where Jews were rescued in World War II, and Paxson had written about refugees being rescued there today too. Stuart wanted them to debate. When Rochat couldn’t come, Stuart asked if he could ask the first question to Paxson.
Rochat had described the rescue as an example of “common decency.” Paxson said the rescue reflected “uncommon decency.” He wanted to ask her if this difference was a matter of semantics, or something deeper. Stuart was an optimist, and I think he wanted her to say that decency was a common trait. As Stuart knew from our many discussions, I didn’t agree with him.
Stuart was an uncommonly decent human being. For me he was a teacher, a fishing co-conspirator, a friend, a mentor and most of all someone who cared about the people around him. It’s hard to imagine Bard without him. And there’s no question – his memory is a blessing.
-Ken Stern
It is with a heavy heart that I share that a good man in my life passed from this life last evening. Stuart Levine was my professor, project advisor, boss and friend – giving me my first job out of college. Since he knew I did not come from deep pockets, he personally paid for my first post-graduate program, my M.S. Ed. from the University at Albany, insisting I keep up my education. He also gave me his personal Mobil gas card and paid for my gas from home to Albany for the duration of the degree so I wouldn’t need loans. I’ve since retired from nearly 33 years as a dean or director of admissions, Holocaust educator and adjunct professor of philosophy. I since went on to the University of Cambridge for additional post-graduate work in Jewish-Christian Studies. (I am presently working in social services as part of a skilled health care team.) I dedicate it all to him and his being there at the right time.
He was very good to me and I will be eternally grateful. I saw him late last fall. I surprised him by just knocking on his office door in Hoffman. We got to reminisce, I told him I loved him and we hugged swearing to stay in touch.
May his memory be for a blessing.
-Tom Maiello
Stuart had a very special way with time. That was, in part, what makes him so timeless. He was a go-to campus historian, yet he always remained very much in the present, able to nimbly skip across the decades from the “Tewksbury Years” to whatever the issue of the day happened to be. Given the challenges of the moment, he even came to embrace Zoom meetings with gusto, though they could never replace his profound affection for the classroom. Virtually or otherwise, he would have one eye on the past, with the other squarely focused on how best to support the students and institution he so dearly loved and to which he devoted so much of his remarkable life. The Lifetime Learning Institute is but one enduring legacy of these harmonious concentrations.
As he sat across from colleagues and friends in the Red Hook Diner, the student side of Kline, or his history-laden office (back in the days before social distancing), he would gently guide time to a standstill. External deadlines would cease to matter; the chaos of the world would fade into meaningless background noise. What, instead, assumed the brilliance of his spotlight were the people in front of him, the possibilities before them, the tunes that carried them, and the echoes of the past that would guide them. His irrepressible warmth, knowing grin, and emphatic calls to action would serve to rally the troops, no matter the circumstances.
STUART, your memory and life’s work will continue to march on, free from the bounds of space and time.
-Justin Hulbert
I loved Dean Levine. He was the guy who approved my job as Bard College Campus Leak Checker and got my the assistant to Chinua Achebe. He also gave me two travel grants to travel across the states and then to Turkey with fellow Bard students to make totally meaningless art, but great and lasting friendships. I remember when he was taking Stephen Shore’s Intro to Photography course and he took a great pic of me (it’s in my mom’s Tivoli attic). That photo means so much to me because I look absolutely ecstatic in it, and I was. Ecstatic to be a 19 year-old at Bard, chillin’ with Dean Levine, honored to be the subject of a portrait, and full of life. He was a great guy. He believed in students and encouraged them to follow their dreams and crazy college schemes. Rest in Peace, Dean Levine. Much love to you.
-Nicole Dreyfus, Bard College class of 1998
Some personal musings on Stuart Levine:
As recently as April 13, Stuart and I were in touch about his return to the Social Studies Division and his fall course offering, Social Studies 121: The History and Conceptual Systems of Psychology. On the same occasion, after he’d read something I’d sent him by my father-in-law, he wrote me a beautiful, little response, which I have saved. He was the Dean of the College when I was a student and, during that time, he soothed my mother by phone when I went missing from the usual Sunday call home — a story he (and she) have continued to remind me of all these years later. A decade after my graduation, I returned to Bard and he had a new name, Stuart Stritzler-Levine, and a new baby. He hired me to teach, with Wagner playing on my entrance and exit from the interview. There were photographs of Nina and Ally that he had taken, and he spoke of his love of photography. When I took the position of Dean of Studies at BHSEC-Manhattan, I moved into Stuart’s office on Mangin Street. But to be clear, he always remained my dean. In the role of divisional chair, I was recently in conversation about him with another faculty member, and reminded her of this fact, that he was my dean—whatever that meant when I said it – probably respect, a certain distance, what one feels towards a mentor. Peter Hutton used to tell the story of how Stuart taught him what it meant for an artist to become a tenure-track teacher and, when Peter told it, it was very funny.
The strange thing about that is, while he had a paternal way about him, students and young faculty members could speak openly to him. In discussing his return to the division, I reminded him that for the sake of faculty autonomy, the convention has been that former and current administrators attend divisional meetings only when the faculty invites them. In retrospect, that seems a bit silly. Stuart had long since retired from administration, returning strictly to teaching and senior project advising. No one could have been more devoted to student well-being. And, truthfully, he was one of few senior faculty members to treat junior faculty as fully autonomous agents whom he expected would express themselves without fear. He advocated for transparency in all things, had an old-fashioned disregard for bureaucratic conflicts of interest; he was always in search of sentimental connections. The division might have appreciated the remains of that culture, in this moment. Of course, he sometimes used that fatherly quality to gloss certain forms of power inequality. But I wonder if what we’ve gained as an institution with more rigid codes of conduct has also entailed some loss of social grace (and interpersonal, high drama). He was far less interested in the “public-facing” than the integrity of the student academic and social experience. This for him was disconnected from rigor, per se. He was an old bardian soul in that he seemed to see teaching as persistence, patience, and a kind of tenderness toward students. He saw the meanness in rigor and urged kindness and flexibility to inspire a love of learning. He really appreciated the residential campus and there too I hear his voice as it reflects a long-gone campus culture: “Tabetha, there’s nothing more natural than college students coming together to have fun over a keg of beer.” Wait! Shouldn’t I be the one saying that? Or, so my much younger self asked.
I’m writing all of this from a particular perspective. I never felt afraid to say what I thought with Stuart, yet we were never peers. Our interactions were mostly affectionate and my random impressions: tall, Ludlow, something to do with basketball, nice suit. Others, who were peers, will have many more tales about this seasoned and wily administrator. I only saw hints of that. Once, I went to his office in Ludlow to say that Bard needed a course on diasporic, black political thought and it needed to do race work for our students on campus, offering as evidence a 10-person tutorial I had been running to satisfy both needs. “Tabetha, are you willing to do that work,” he asked in a weighty tone? Um, I’m an early-modern French historian who has only taken a couple of graduate courses on the subject. For fun. “Good.” What? I found myself negotiating for what I never said I would do: I won’t ask students ask for conventional papers or meet at normal class times. He looked satisfied and offered, “you’re the teacher.” He gave me a wonderful gift. I had permission to teach material that electrifies from the moment students lay eyes on it.
“TABETHA,” he recently wrote in that way he had of addressing one in all caps, “You are a thoughtful and diligent divisional chair. Keep the position for a long time.” As vividly as I’ve felt the honor of serving my amazing division and as gratefully as I’ve received expressions of recognition from its faculty, especially as my tenure comes to an end, Stuart’s words are uniquely fulfilling. There is something precious about a very old relationship that remains fundamentally unchanged.
-Tabetha Ewing
After all the freshman orientation stuff, my first freshman class to meet was Stuart Levine’s Social Psychology course. Incredibly valuable, and I was keeping up with the textbook reading for the first several weeks. Levine was a fine teacher, and I remember my hand shooting up in class fairly often to discuss the course content that was being covered. After a few weeks of this, Levine got to the point of asking the class questions from the readings with the preface “Anybody besides Brian?” I was a bit mortified. He was a great teacher though. Twenty or so years later I saw him at an alumni holiday gathering here in Chicago, we had a good talk.
-Brian Nielsen
I’m remembering Stuart Levine on Florence Nightingale’s 200th birthday. Nightingale might seem an unlikely person to associate with Stuart, yet I always will. In Fall 2018 Stuart asked to come to my Statistics class and tell the students about important statisticians. I asked him to focus on important female figures my textbook overlooked. He ran with it, and in the summer before the semester, he sent me a series of emails (with the traditional all-caps salutations) to share his excitement about what he was learning. That fall he came to Statistics and presented several times; I learned a great deal, especially about Nightingale’s contributions to methods I often use. This initiative shows so much about Stuart – his love of history, desire to portray portraits in word and image, fondness for both data and individual narratives, willingness to always learn (which included getting up to speed on Zoom in these last months), and his ceaseless drive to create moments to interact with our students.
This past fall he expanded the project in Justin Dainer-Best’s class and discovered that one of his new subjects had, like him, graduated from Brooklyn’s Midwood High School within a year or two of him. This coincidence delighted him – not only did he love serendipity, but it embodied Stanley Milgram’s lesser- known work on “Six Degrees of Separation.” He struck up a correspondence with her in the same way he had become a digital interlocutor with Milgram scholars throughout the world.
As social psychologists, Stuart and I shared a fascination with the origins of human behavior, and especially the puzzle of how seemingly good people are capable of committing terrible deeds. He’d send me articles to read – sometimes suggestions, sometimes formal assignments to be discussed over lunch on the student side of the cafeteria or over a “light Chinese snack” in Rhinebeck. While we didn’t always agree about data or program matters, we always came back together to our shared cares of our discipline and our students.
Our collective efforts gave Stuart joy, and for him everything else led from there. In the year or two before I stood for tenure he told me not to worry – because I loved my work, he said, I was good at it. In the face of the hectic drum of our daily lives he was a constant advocate for one thing: more time with the students. Longer midway boards, walks through campus to give seniors their grades rather than doing so via crite sheets, extended student presentations, expanded and leisurely moments to connect. Every extra minute meant more joy. Since March we corresponded about the difficulty of physical separation from the conversing, collaborating, thinking, and advising that fill our days. This closing line of one of his emails makes my heart wistful and warm in equal measure: “So we will all continue and miss our regular routines but adapt as best we can. I truly love my colleagues very much.”
I’ve been sending out periodic video and text greetings to Psychology students from our faculty during our period of remote learning. I’ll let the last lines of Stuart’s greeting, which I sent on the Monday before we lost him, remind us of his core better than my words ever could:
ONE CAN MISS MANY THINGS IN THIS TIME OF ISOLATION BUT THAT WHICH I MISS MOST IS THE CASUAL AND OCCASIONAL DROP-IN OF A STUDENT OR TWO DURING A DAY. SUCH ALWAYS REMINDS ME OF THE VERY CENTER OF LIFE THESE PAST 55 YEARS – THE SUSTAINED PRESENCE AND ANIMATION OF THAT WHICH I NOW MISS AND WHICH BRINGS SATISFACTION – THE BARD UNDERGRADUATE.
-Kristin Lane
I want to add to the college-wide expressions of sadness about the loss of Stuart Levine and to share in the many expressions of regard for his achievements and collegial companionship. He and I belong to a generation whose work is done, but his presence remained as a source of decency and support. A recent e-mail to me from Stuart was headed “a perfect send-off.” He deserves it.
-David Kettler
Sometime around the fall of 1990 or winter of 1991 I participated in the Immediate Decision Plan program for perspective Bard Students. The first part of the day consisted of a class led by Dean Levine, for which we received some prep materials in advance if I recall correctly. As we were getting started with the class, Dean Levine spoke a bit about how what we were doing was to give us a sense of what classes at Bard were like, stressing that this was as much for us to decide if Bard was right for us as anything else. Mid sentence, he pointed at a button on the shirt of a perspective student, and enthusiastically read outloud what it said, “Question authority!” He went on to say, “Now that is one of my favorite sayings! This is exactly what you should be doing in everything you study and do in life!” In that one moment, he truly spoke to what Bard was about and set the tone for me – I knew I would like this place! I found statement, especially coming from someone that could be viewed as an authority figure by a bunch of 17 and 18 year olds, inspiring! I went on to study at Bard and had other interactions with Dean Levine over the years, all of which I was fond of, but this moment sticks out in my mind.
Incidentally, at Bard I pursued my passions – music, art and the study of Spanish language and Latin American Studies – and have gone on to teach music and Spanish, to travel to a number of different countries, to play hundreds of gigs, and eventually to settle into a wonderful job as the K-12 Performing
Arts Curriculum Coordinator for the Public Schools of Brookline, Massachusetts. I continue to question authority and I encourage young people to do so as well!
-Kenny Kozol, Bard College Class of 1997
I first met Stuart Levine in the fall of 2017. I had just published a book in which the relation between philosophy and social psychology was a major theme, especially the ethical and psychological significance of Milgram’s obedience experiments. Leon read the book and had the idea of introducing me to Stuart. From the first day I met him, I found him to be a wonderfully generous and enthusiastic interlocutor. He had decades of experience thinking and writing about Milgram’s work and knew the literature on it profoundly; I had only begun to work in what Stuart lovingly called “the Milgram domain” relatively recently. Yet he was unfailingly receptive and engaged with my interpretations. When I made arguments about the limits of Milgram’s experimental design, he was eager to share with me alternative designs that he knew of and to propose new ones of his own. Starting in 2018, he invited me to visit his Milgram seminar and speak about my work every spring. In these sessions, I saw how Stuart’s enthusiasm and generosity inspired his students as well. He was an extraordinary colleague and his presence on campus will be profoundly missed.
-Jay Elliott