University Registrar Retires

Jeff von Munkwitz-Smith used Post-It notes to stay organized. Photo by Cydney Scott

Jeffrey von Munkwitz-Smith is eager for the University to adopt new class-scheduling policies, expanding the time between classes from 10 minutes to 15 minutes and standardizing class-meeting patterns as much as possible, starting in spring 2017. “We have a two-mile-long campus, and 10 minutes isn’t enough,” he says. Among other improvements, that difference would help students who take classes outside their own schools. “We want them to be able to explore,” von Munkwitz-Smith says.

As it happens, he won’t be on campus to witness the change. On Christmas Eve, after nearly four years as the University registrar and assistant vice president, von Munkwitz-Smith, who is known for his signature bowtie and white ponytail, is retiring.

The office von Munkwitz-Smith runs maintains student records, issues diplomas, and produces class schedules, among other responsibilities. The scheduling changes that he hopes for, proposed by the Office of the Provost and the Office of the University Registrar, are planned to coincide with the implementation of software that his office is installing.

Other BU projects that the outgoing registrar has overseen are outsourcing the ordering and delivery of BU transcripts, moving the release date of the electronic Academic Bulletin from September back to June to accommodate freshmen arriving for Orientation throughout the summer, standardizing the evaluation of transfer credits, and creating a database of past transfers to streamline the process. Working with other departments, he also led the renovation of 68 classrooms across campus to make them more modern and flexible.

Von Munkwitz-Smith started at BU in March 2012, after 16 years as University of Connecticut registrar and 22 years in various positions in the registrar’s office at the University of Minnesota.

“Jeff began work immediately to strengthen the staff and operations of the Office of the University Registrar and to build effective relationships across both campuses,” says Laurie Pohl, vice president for enrollment and student affairs. “He modernized and expanded the office’s role, leaving us with a really strong organization.”

Pohl chairs a search committee that has begun screening candidates to replace him. She expects they will make a choice in the spring and that the new registrar will take up the post by the time the new academic year begins.

A past president of the 11,000-member American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, von Munkwitz-Smith will continue to work on projects with the group and as editor of its journal. He and his wife are moving to Portland, Maine, a longtime vacation destination, where they own a condo. They plan to volunteer in the community and travel, perhaps including a drive along Route 1 from Maine to the Florida Keys.

Von Munkwitz-Smith began his career at the University of Minnesota, where he worked in the registrar’s office while studying for a PhD in South Asian languages. It turned out that there were a lot more jobs for registrars than there were for Sanskrit scholars.

He says he wishes he’d been able to overhaul the student information database system, which lacks flexibility to deal with issues such as name and pronoun changes resulting from transgender students transitioning.

He notes with pride that the registrar’s office was the first department at the University to achieve platinum-level certification for sustainability. His likeness was on one of sustainability@BU’s first posters.

“It was a little disconcerting to see it eight feet high on the side of Warren Towers,” he says. “I still see them on buses occasionally. One was on the shuttle the other day, and a student said, ‘That’s you!’”