I Am West Georgia

Name: Peter Hoff

Job title: Interim Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs.

What I really do: Oversee UWG’s colleges and schools, and try to make sure we offer the finest education available.

Years at UWG: Just arrived.

Before UWG, I: Was president of the University of Maine and a professor in UMaine’s Honors College.

I came to UWG because: President Sethna asked me to help for a year while we find someone to take over the provost’s job on a more permanent basis.

One thing I would change about UWG: I would modify the climate so the temperature never rose above 85 degrees.

I was born in: Atlanta.

Family members are: Intelligent, talented and a bit wacky.

People describe me as: Driven. So far they haven’t found out the truth.

Most colleagues don’t know that: I have played French horn in symphony orchestras almost all my life.

Favorite things to do: Spend time with my wife, Dianne, and our two Wheaten Terriers, Wheaties and Chex. Do genealogical research. Watch the Atlanta Braves, which was been my favorite team since 1953, when they came to Milwaukee from Boston.

Favorite quote: “…fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds’ worth of distance run.” – Rudyard Kipling.

Proudest accomplishment so far: Won the outstanding teaching award at the University of Wisconsin.

Pet peeve: People who say, “That’s the way we have always done it,” as if this was a reason for not changing.

Best advice ever received: Never lose your cool.

Best advice for new faculty and staff: You have the best job in the world; you are creating the future. Do great things with the opportunity!

What I most want to contribute to students: Self-confidence and a love of learning for its own sake.

The book everyone should read: There are so many great books, but for the broadest readership today, especially students, Hot, Flat and Crowded by Thomas Friedman.

The movie everyone should watch: Dr. Strangelove.

The person, dead or alive, I’d most like to meet: My 33rd great grandfather, Charlemagne.

The place I’d love to travel to where I haven’t been yet: St. Petersburg, Russia.

Although you didn’t ask, I’d like to tell you anyway: I believe the academic major is the most overrated part of a college degree. Not that it isn’t important, but we tend to overemphasize its importance at the expense of the courses that make us more complete people, broaden our views of the world, give us the skills to compete in life and work, and perhaps most important, prepare us to be citizens of a democracy where we are called upon to operate the most complex country in the world.