Senator Kennedy in Talks with UMass Boston to Establish New Center for Study of the Senate

By Joe Peters

UMass Boston's role as a major policy shaper in the region and country will be getting another boost in the near future if an agreement is reached on a center and program named in honor of Senator Edward M. Kennedy.

The three-party proposal involving the JFK Library and Museum, UMass Boston, and Senator Kennedy's office is still being negotiated, but it likely will involve Kennedy's papers residing at the JFK Library and an academic center, possibly named the "Center for Study of the Senate," housed at UMass Boston.

A formal agreement may be presented to the UMass Board of Trustees as early as its November 5 meeting. While the JFK Library is a federal operation, it resides on UMass Boston property. Any expansion, such as that for the papers covering Senator Kennedy's four decades in Congress, would require UMass approval.

Many other institutions were rumored to be interested in Kennedy's papers. UMass Boston emerging as the prime candidate signals the campus's rise as a major policy institution.

"We think of this as a major coup," UMass Boston chancellor Jo Ann Gora recently told the Associated Press. "[Kennedy] arguably has had the most significant impact on the development of major policy issues of any senator in the twentieth century."

"There would be no American democracy without the United States Senate, and it is difficult to imagine the Senate without the powerful voice of Edward M. Kennedy," UMass interim president Jack Wilson added in an interview with The Boston Globe. "The University of Massachusetts is pleased to forge this exciting new relationship with the senator and the Senate."

Negotiations between Kennedy and UMass reportedly began about a year ago when the senator met with former UMass president William Bulger. Kennedy's mantra of serving the working class apparently made for a natural fit with urban-mission UMass Boston, where many students work full-time while attending school.

If the proposal goes forward, it will be the latest in a series of achievements connecting the campus with major political figures and events. In December 1998, Healey Library became the repository for Judge Arthur Garrity's papers in the landmark case that resulted in a new busing plan for Boston students.

In October 2000, the campus hosted the first presidential debate of the election season. In August of this year, the university formally constituted the McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies, uniting the McCormack Institute with the gerontology, public policy, and public affairs graduate programs. October saw the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy host the New England Women's Political Summit.

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