Higher Ground: My American Dreams and Nightmares in the Hidden Halls of Academia

In this bumpy debut memoir, former UC Davis chancellor Katehi shares her perspective on the controversies that forced her from office in 2016. The book’s most successful sections detail Katehi’s childhood in Greece and her relationship with her parents, who encouraged her to pursue an education. She parlayed success in male-dominated engineering programs to a professor position in the University of Michigan’s engineering department, and then became the engineering dean at Purdue University in 2002. Katehi hints at the troubles to come (and establishes the book’s defensive tone) in the account of her Michigan tenure, writing that her “visible presence, forceful character, and professional success split my colleagues into two camps: those who loved me and those who hated me.” Appointed UC Davis chancellor in 2009, she stepped down after what she maintains was a smear campaign, despite findings by an outside law firm that substantiated claims she used university resources to scrub unfavorable online statements about her from the internet. Readers unfamiliar with the allegations, which also included claims Katehi employed and gave preferential treatment to her family members and held outside board memberships that generated conflicts of interest, will find little in the way of explanation here. Instead, Katehi alludes to the central conflict with imprecise language (“I resigned from my position as chancellor after a six-month ordeal”), generating more confusion than empathy. This misses the mark. (Aug.)