Antioch University McGregor’s new president, Dr. Michael Fishbein

Dr. Michael Fishbein, the new president of Antioch University McGregor in Yellow Springs, experienced the institution’s branding challenges almost from the moment he moved here from New Hampshire in June.

When he and his wife, Mary Ann Oppenheimer, were shopping for things they needed for their new home, salespeople naturally asked what brought them to the Dayton area.

“I would say, ‘I’m the president of Antioch University McGregor,’ and people would say, ‘Oh, I didn’t know the college was reopening,’” he recalls.

Antioch University McGregor is part of the Antioch University system, but independent of the currently defunct Antioch College; McGregor was established 21 years ago. Two years ago, it moved from Antioch College’s campus to its own site a few miles west.

McGregor provides adults with undergraduate completion and graduate programs.

“Many people can be forgiven for thinking it was all one,” he adds.

But Fishbein says he has ideas to solve this problem. This involves the positive aspects of sharing the Antioch brand.

These positives, he says, led him to leave his position as provost and vice president of academic affairs at Daniel Webster College in Nashua, N.H. and accept the presidency at McGregor.

“The idea of taking responsibility for and leading a campus which has as its explicit mission the higher education of people who care about the world into which they will graduate — to make a difference, to make the world a more equal, a fairer and better place — was irresistible.”

His plan is to leverage this tradition of social justice and involve the region’s faith communities with McGregor.

“When you think about the social justice orientation of a campus like Antioch McGregor, you think, who is naturally attracted to that set of values?” he asks.

“And you find yourself thinking more and more about faith communities. You think about commitments to poverty and ending hunger and who are the organizations at the center of that. It’s the religious communities.”

On a personal level, he identifies with Rabbi Hillel’s ancient dictum found in Judaism’s Ethics of the Fathers: “If I am only for myself, then what am I?”

Fishbein wants to see if there’s a way to position McGregor as an “honest broker” for interfaith dialogue.

“We would not take sides,” he says. “And when I talk about faith communities, there’s also the community of non-believers. I’m not seeking to have us become a religious organization in any sense. But I think there’s a natural affinity in the value systems of the faith communities in the region and the kinds of things that Antioch McGregor stands for.”

He envisions representatives from various faith communities coming to campus to engage in dialogue and debate, “perhaps to midwife social action projects in the community.”

Fishbein says he shared this vision with the McGregor campus and leaders involved in its near-term strategic planning a few weeks ago.

“I’ve gotten some cautiously optimistic positive responses. The question now is how can we do that? Is it workable?”

The answer, he says, will depend on whether McGregor is able to reach out to umbrella religious organizations.

“There are so many small churches and temples of every stripe and denomination that if we have to do it one small group at a time, it’s not going to work. But if there are interfaith organizations we can reach out to — the local board of rabbis, the local archdiocese, the Pentecostals’ organizations, evangelicals — if we can do that, we can succeed.”

Fishbein, 56, grew up in Queens, N.Y. and received his bachelor’s degree in psychology from Bernard M. Baruch College of the City University of New York. He earned his master’s degree and Ph.D. in social psychology at Clark University in Worcester, Mass.

He has also held positions at Lyndon State College, Cazenovia College, the College of Saint Rose, The Sage Colleges, and Roosevelt University. Among his areas of lifelong study is the science of inhumanity.

Beginning this month, his wife will serve in the part-time position of foundation director with the Jewish Federation of Greater Dayton. They are also members of Beth Abraham Synagogue.