| Jean Elizabeth Spencer made major contributions of benefit to Prince George's County and to all the citizens of Maryland through her life-ling commitment to improving governmental public administration, and educational systems and services. She broke the glass ceiling in Maryland higher education when she became Executive Director of the Board of Trustees of the State Universities and Colleges, and later, Deputy Chancellor of the University of Maryland systems. She also is credited with helping to implement major state governmental and educational reform and was instrumental in re-establishing a state organization to work specifically on behalf of women. In March 1993, she received one of the State's highest honors -- election to the Maryland Women's Hall of Fame.
Jean Spencer was born on March 28, 1933. She moved to College Park, Maryland, at the age of 14 when her mother took a faculty position at the University of Maryland. She lived in Prince George's County the remainder of her life. After high school, she attended the University of Maryland, completing her doctorate in the field of political science.
As a faculty member and member of the governmental research bureau of the University of Maryland, she gained wide recognition as an expert on state and local government. Based on her experience and expertise in this area, Governor Tawes selected her to be staff director of the Curlette Commission, created to reorganize Maryland's executive branch. She continued as the Commission's staff director under Governors Agnew and Mandel. Governor Mandel implemented state executive branch reorganization to form a cabinet system much like the federal government's based on recommendations from the Commission.
Following her work on the Curlette Commission, Dr. Spencer became the research staff director for the Maryland Constitutional Convention of 1967-1968. This convention drafted a proposed state constitution hailed as a model of state government reform across the nation. Though the proposed constitution was defeated by referendum vote in 1968, it has served as a blueprint for governmental reform in Maryland for the past 25 years; most of its major recommendations have been adopted as amendments to the State constitution, laws enacted by the legislature, or by executive order of the governor.
Dr. Spencer served for three years as information and research director for Vice-President Agnew before returning to Maryland as the Executive Director of the Board of Trustees of the State Universities and Colleges. Among other accomplishments, she was instrumental in gaining cost-saving consolidation of programs and services among the member institutions that included Towson, Frostburg, Coppin, and Bowie. She also served her community in various ways, e.g., she was appointed by the Prince George's County Executive to serve on the Supplemental Student Loan Authority Board.
In addition, Dr. Spencer was committed to programs for the advancement of women. She was responsible for the reactivation of the State Commission on the Status of Women in 1968 to which she acted as staff advisor. In 1971, it was re-named the Maryland Commission for Women and was established by law. In later years, Dr. Spencer founded the Women's Forum of the University of Maryland System to bring together, for the first time, a mechanism to raise the concerns of women employees. The Forum remains the primary voice for women in the University of Maryland System today.
Dr. Spencer is also generally regarded as instrumental in developing the plan for the 1988 reorganization of Maryland's higher education system, and in 1990 she became the Deputy Chancellor of the system that includes all four-year publicly-funded colleges and universities in Maryland.
In her leisure hours, Dr. Spencer was an award-winning photographer and poet and researched and published a family genealogical history.
In March, 1992, Dr. Spencer died suddenly from a pulmonary embolus. She was 58. |
