Ofelia Garcia, MFA
10th President of Rosemont College 1991 - 1995
Ofelia Garcia, a native of Havana, Cuba, came to the United States at age nineteen seeking political asylum during Castro’s revolution. In Cuba, she studied drawing and sculpture at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes.
She earned a B.A. degree in studio art from Manhattanville College in New York, and a M.F.A. degree in Printmaking and Drawing at Tufts University/Boston Museum School. As a Kent-Danforth Fellow, she pursued further studies in comparative religion and cultures at Duke University.
Ofelia Garcia served as Director of Studio Art at Boston College. Later, she became the Director of The Print Club in Philadelphia and also served as General Critic at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. She became President of The Atlanta College of Art before coming to Rosemont College as its 10th President in 1991.
President Garcia was a strong believer in women’s colleges and in the importance for students to have a sense of self, and a sense of others in the world about them. During her tenure at Rosemont, the ROCAD (Rosemont College Accelerated Degree) program was introduced, welcoming both male and female adult learners. Principles were established that would allow for other undergraduate and graduate degree programs to develop in the future. A Gallery Management and Performance Arts Management certificate program were initiated, as well as the formation of the Rosemont College Institute for Learning in Retirement (renamed The Forum) under the guidance of the Office of Continuing Education.
As President of Rosemont, she served on various boards and executive committees such as Haverford College, the American Council on Education, Council of Independent Colleges, Middle States, and the Women’s College Coalition.
After leaving Rosemont in 1995, Garcia served as Senior Fellow of the American Council on Education; then, as Dean of Arts and Communication at William Patterson University. After 10 years as Dean, she retired to the faculty as a professor of art. Currently, she serves on the New Jersey Council on the Arts as well as the Hudson County Public Arts Commission.
Ofelia’s extra curricular activities have touched the Jersey City Museum (Chair Emerita), board of Haverford College until 2004, New Jersey Council of the Arts, and the Hudson County Public Arts Commission. In February 2011, she received a “Lifetime Achievement Award” from the College Art Association / Women’s Caucus for Art.