Stephen Balch

Dr. Balch is the Executive Director of the Institute for the Study of Western Civilization at Texas Tech University and the founder and president of the National Association of Scholars, America’s largest and most active membership organization of scholars committed to higher education reform. He holds a Ph.D in political science from the University of California at Berkeley and, for fourteen years, was a member of the Government faculty at John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the City University of New York. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni and has played an important role in the founding of four other higher education reform organizations. He is the author of a variety of articles on the problems of higher education, his comments appear frequently in the media, and he has spoken before academic and general audiences on many campuses.

Josiah Bunting III

General Bunting was graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1963. He subsequently studied at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar and at Columbia University as a John Burgess Fellow. During active duty with the United States Army, he served as an infantry officer in Vietnam with the Ninth Infantry Division. During his military career, General Bunting received the Bronze Star with two Oak Leaf Clusters, Army Commendation Medal, Vietnam Honor Medal–2nd class, Presidential Unit Citation, Parachute Badge, Combat Infantry Badge, and Ranger Tab. Subsequently, he taught history at West Point and at the Naval War College. His administrative experience in higher education includes: President, Briarcliff College (1973-1977); President, Hampden-Sydney College (1977-1987); and Superintendent, VMI (1995-2003). General Bunting has published four novels, including The Lionheads (G. Braziller, 1972), a best-seller that was selected by Time Magazine as one of “The Ten Best Novels” of 1973. More recently, he has completed several works of non-fiction An Education for Our Time (Regnery 1998) and a biography Ulysses S. Grant (Times Book, 2004). He is chairman of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s National Civic Literacy Board and president of the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation. He also serves on the National Council of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Harlan Calkins

Mr. Calkins was graduated from Hamilton College in 1954 with a BA as a chemistry major.  He is the chairman and CEO of Rochester Midland Corporation, a leading supplier in North America of industrial cleaners and other chemical products.  Mr. Calkins serves on the boards of numerous business and philanthropic organizations, including  Security Trust, Highland Hospital, the Al Sigl Foundation, and Rochester Telephone, all in Rochester, New York as well as Norstar Bank, in Buffalo, New York;  and Malden Trust, in Malden, Massachusetts.  At Hamilton College he was a member of the Delta Upsilon Fraternity and DT, Was Los, and Pentagon societies. He co-captained the soccer and baseball teams. In 1956-1957, he served in the United States Army in counter-intelligence while stationed in Japan. In 2010, Mr. Calkins was inducted into the Rochester Business Hall of Fame.

Richard A. Erlanger (Emeritus President)

Mr. Erlanger, a 1963 graduate of Hamilton College, has spent his entire career advising, managing, and investing in venture and private equity portfolio companies as an individual and as a member of investment groups. He has also taken full-time operating positions in troubled companies where his investment was at risk and hired successors once the operations were stabilized. His early career included stints at Arthur D. Little, Inc. and McKinsey & Company as well as GE Finance. Recent private equity and venture investments include LivHome (Home Health Care), Cape Cod Potato Chips, and Yofarm Yogurt. He graduated from the Taft School (1959), Hamilton College (1963) and Columbia University Graduate School of Business (1969-MBA Operations Research and Finance). During the Vietnam War Mr. Erlanger served as Engineering Officer on a destroyer in the Tonkin Gulf. He has been an active participant in the AHI since its inception.

Kraig Kayser

Mr. Kayser is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Seneca Foods Corporation and has served in that capacity since 1993.  From 1991 to 1993 he was Chief Financial Officer of the Company.  He has served as a director of the Company since 1985.  Mr. Kayser has served as an officer and/or director of the Company for over 25 years, providing continuity of executive leadership through all phases of the food processing industry and economic cycles. Mr. Kayser is also a director of Moog Inc. where he serves on the Audit Committee and the Nominating and Governance Committee.  He received a B.A. from Hamilton College and an M.B.A. from Cornell University.

Anne D. Neal

Ms. Neal is president of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a non-profit, non-partisan, educational organization dedicated to academic freedom, excellence, and accountability in higher education. Prior to joining ACTA, she served in a senior role at the National Endowment for the Humanities and specialized in the First Amendment at the New York City law firm of Rogers & Wells. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude from Harvard College with an A.B. in American history and literature and earned her J.D. from Harvard Law School , where she served as the first woman editor of the Harvard Journal on Legislation.