A new center at the University of Northern Iowa will be dedicated to one of its most famous graduates, with U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley.
The Iowa Board of Regents on Thursday approved the “Chuck and Barbara Grassley Center,” which will give the senator’s collected papers a permanent home at the heart of the UNI campus in Cedar Falls.
Grassley earned his bachelor’s at the school in 1955 and a master’s the year after. He gifted UNI his pre-senate papers in the 1980s and plans to give his remaining materials.
University president Mark Nook says they’ve prepared for the arrival.
“We knew his collection was coming our way upon his departure from the Senate and we look forward to establishing this center, taking care of those archival materials, making them available to the general public, and building a strong center that serves the people of Iowa,” Nook said. (15 SECS)
The naming will become official when Grassley leaves public office.
He has filed to run for a ninth term in 2028, when he’ll be 95, but has not announced an official campaign.
*In other Board of Regents action, a plan to keep the University of Iowa’s Center for Intellectual Freedom independent from the university was approved.
The plan outlines how the center will remain administratively independent.
This includes keeping the center's records separate from the university – including correspondence and financial records.
Additionally, the Center’s budget would be approved by the board but wouldn’t need approval from the university.
Regent Christine Hensley says the plan received pushback from some advisory members of the Center.
“I'll be real honest with you right now; they're not satisfied with the document, but they are an advisory committee, and the Board of Regents has final authority to approve that,” she said.
Hensley says the advisory members had a chance to submit additional suggestion, which they did not do.
