John F. Schwaller, Educational Administration

John F. Schwaller (MA Spanish, 1971) is the 15th President of the State University of New York at Potsdam. His career in higher education spans more than 30 years. He served as the vice chancellor for academic affairs and dean, and professor of history and languages from 2001-2006 at University of Minnesota, Morris. From 1995-2001, he was associate provost and associate vice president for academic affairs at the University of Montana, Missoula. Previously, Dr. Schwaller was the director of the Academy of American Franciscan History at the Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley, California. Dr. Schwaller began his teaching career at the Schmidt College of Arts and Humanities at Florida Atlantic University, where he also held a number of important administrative positions over a fourteen-year period.

A nationally-recognized scholar of early colonial Latin America, and of Nahuatl and the Nahua (the Aztec language and people) Dr. Schwaller is the author of five books and the editor of three others. Additionally, Dr. Schwaller is the author of some 50 articles in leading scholarly journals and has more than 100 professional papers and presentations to his credit. He sits on the Editorial Board of two scholarly journals, The Americas and Estudios de Cultura Nahuatl.

President Schwaller earned a Bachelor of Arts in History from Grinnell College in 1969 and a Doctorate in Colonial Latin America History from Indiana University in 1978. In 2009 he was awarded a Doctorate of Humane Letters, honoris causa, by Grinnell College in recognition of his accomplishments in higher education.