Clara Yu, longtime language professor at Middlebury College in Vermont and former president of the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, passed away on January 1. She was 77 years old.
Born in Chongqing, China, Dr. Yu grew up in Taiwan and earned her bachelor’s degree in English from the National Taiwan University. She then pursued graduate studies in the United States, ultimately receiving her Ph.D. in comparative literature from the University of Illinois.
After teaching stints at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire and the University of Maryland, Dr. Yu began her tenure at Middlebury College in 1987 as an assistant professor of Chinese language and literature. She received tenure in 1993. Throughout her time with Middlebury, she served in several leadership roles, including vice president for languages, director of the Summer Language Schools, and founding director of the Center for Educational Technology. Additionally, she established and served as the first director of the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education, a nonprofit organization that promoted technological innovation and collaboration among more than 80 liberal arts colleges.
In 2005, Dr. Yu came out of a brief retirement to help in Middlebury’s acquisition of the Monterey Institute of International Studies in California. From 2006 to 2008, she was president of the newly established Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.
Dr. Yu was the author of To the Interior: Poems by Clara Yu (Bookman Books, 1992), which was published in both English and Chinese.