December 2, 2002 -- Bruce R. James, 60, of Washington, D.C., and Lake Tahoe, Nevada, was elected chairman of the Board of Trustees of Rochester Institute of Technology on Nov. 15. A 1964 graduate of RIT’s School of Printing Management and Sciences and a trustee since 1994, James was named Outstanding Alumnus in 1996, delivered the Convocation address in 1997 and, most recently, chaired the launch of RIT’s $300 million capital campaign, "Powered by the Future." James, who founded more than a dozen technologically-based printing and publishing enterprises over a 30-year career, including Barclays Law Publishers (San Francisco) which INC magazine selected four straight years as one of America’s 500 fastest growing companies, retired in 1993 to devote time to public service. He now serves as the 24th Public Printer of the United States, a post once held by Benjamin Franklin. President Bush’s nomination of James to the post was just approved Nov. 21. As the Public Printer he oversees information gathering, processing and distribution for all three branches of the federal government-ranging from the Congressional Record to the Reports of the Supreme Court, to IRS forms and passports. RIT, founded in 1829, is one of the nation’s leading private, comprehensive universities with more than 15,000 students from all 50 states and 92 foreign countries. Known worldwide for its First in Class programs in applied science and technology, RIT offers 240 degree programs across eight colleges located on a master-planned, 1,400-acre campus in suburban Rochester, N.Y., first occupied in 1967. Through partnerships with local, state and federal governments and alliances with more than 1,000 of the world’s leading businesses, RIT students engage in a variety of classroom, laboratory and cooperative workplace experiences preparing them to be the next generation of entrepreneurial business, government and community leaders. Commenting on his new role, James said, "I’ve loved RIT for more than 40 years. I came here first as a scholarship student with no history of anyone in my family attending college. What a tremendous experience it was to engage a brilliant faculty and motivated and enterprising fellow students. I give RIT credit for sparking what success I may have had and look forward to working with President Simone and my fellow trustees to ensure that RIT remains one of the nation’s most innovative and important teaching and learning universities. "As trustees, one of our roles is to keep the administration and faculty focused on the changing needs of business and government so that RIT graduates remain sought after for their well-rounded, technologically-sound educations," added James. "We are particularly fortunate at RIT to have more than 80 active and emeritus trustees representing a broad cross-section of America and including many of our most prominent alumni." "I’ve known Bruce James since I became president of RIT in 1992," commented Albert J. Simone. "We have more than 80,000 successful alumni so it’s hard to pick out any one or two. But, I have to say that while Bruce has been extremely busy and successful in so many ways, he, nonetheless, has remained a great booster and supporter of RIT. He is deeply steeped in the institution’s culture and helped to develop our strategic plan. "His colleagues on the board of trustees could not have picked a more capable or enthusiastic leader. He’ll be a great partner as we continue our move to First in Class in more and more disciplines, and build an ever better learning environment for our students and teaching environment for our faculty." James and his wife, Nora, have an apartment in the heart of Washington, D.C., and maintain their permanent residence at Lake Tahoe in northern Nevada. They have three grown sons living in the San Francisco Bay Area and three grandchildren. James is a trustee and immediate past board chairman of Sierra Nevada College, Nevada’s only private, nonprofit, residential college located at Lake Tahoe.