Introducing Brother Stan Stanislaus Sobczyk takes over as the new president of CBU. by DANIEL CONNOLLY is friends and colleagues call him Brother Stan. Christian Brothers University's board of trustees named Stanislaus Sobczyk president in February, following Brother Michael J. McGinniss' appointment to the presidency of La Salle University in Pennsylvania. Sobczyk (pronounced SUB-chick) started work June 21st. While Sobczyk's ideas about the future of the small Roman Catholic university are sometimes strikingly original, they're all consistent, he explains, with the philosophy of St. Jean-Baptiste de La Salle, who founded the Brothers of Christian Schools in 1684. "[De La Salle] saw salvation as twofold," says Sobczyk. "He said, 'We form the schools so that the young [people] entrusted to our care come to know God and can somehow be helped on the path that will eventually get them to heaven." Secondly, he says, "De La Salle's definition of salvation was that in the here and now, life can be better for them personally and for their families by means of having an education that will allow them to have good jobs." Sobczyk says that there has always been a "practical bent" to the kind of education that the Christian Brothers (the descriptive term for their order is "Lasallian") provide in 950 institutions in 85 countries around the world. In the case of CBU, this means that the goal is to integrate the university fully into public life, not to create an isolated entity of pure intellectualism. "I'm saying to business leaders as I meet with them, 'What kind of needs do you have, and do we have the resources to help you meet some of them?" Sobczyk says. That won't be easy. CBU's current endowment is a relatively low $26 million (by comparison, Rhodes College's endowment is more than $200 million), and Sobczyk is expected to devote a great deal of time to fund-raising over the next few months. Sobczyk brings up the possibility of holding seminars for minority entrepreneurs and of forming a partnership with United Parcel Service, referring to the arrangement UPS has established in Louisville that allows the company's workers to attend college classes for free. That idea overlaps with another aspect of Lasallian educational philosophy, Sobczyk says -- the goal of providing education to those who wouldn't get it otherwise. CBU has had an evening program since 1978, and Sobczyk says that he wants the school to broaden its base by opening more branch campuses aimed at working adults. There's currently just one such campus, at St. Benedict's school in Cordova. And Sobczyk dreams of training a cadre of teachers to man the Catholic schools reopening in the inner city of Memphis. Sobczyk says that he also wants CBU to be a focal point for explorations of the ethics of "emerging businesses." "I don't know of anyone that's had a conference or seminar or workshop on ethical issues surrounding e-commerce," he says. Sobczyk, now 54, was born in Omaha, Nebraska. He says he knew he wanted to commit himself to the religious life and be a teacher, but wasn't interested in being a priest. He attended CBU himself, graduating in 1966 with a degree in philosophy and theology before taking a variety of jobs in teaching and school administration. Sobczyk earned a master's in geography from St. Louis University in 1972, a second master's in educational administration from the University of Memphis, and a doctorate in the same subject from the University of San Francisco. Brother Stan has already spent a fair amount of time in Memphis, directing a retreat center on the CBU campus from 1980 until 1984 and serving as interim president of CBU in 1993-1994. He spent much of 1998-1999 studying at a Lasallian institution in Rome, but before arriving there went on a "world tour of Catholic Lasallian institutions" making brief stops from Thailand to Palestine, where he visited a casino run by graduates of Bethlehem University's hotel management school. He thought of playing blackjack, but the minimum bet was $25. "Needless to say, I had a little something to drink and that was it." He has an interesting hobby. He learned to knit while earning his doctorate and continues to do so in his spare time. "When my brother and I went to Europe in 1990, I took my knitting with me, and people would say, 'You're going to knit on the planes?' and I said, 'I'm never going to see those people again in my life. What do I care what they think?'" Though most college presidents are concerned with enhancing their schools' reputations, Sobczyk says that's not a top priority for him. "We will be the best if we teach well." About 1,200 students attend CBU during the day, and about 700 more attend its evening undergraduate and graduate programs. The school offers master's degrees in business, engineering, and teaching. Just 30 percent of the students, who come from 35 states and 40 countries, are Catholic. "Frankly, I don't care if [what we do] makes us the best in the world," he adds. "As long as we're helping people by means of education and by our teaching to achieve salvation in the here and now, in the very real world of Memphis. And hopefully, some of the things we do and the relationships we build will help them to think about that creator God out there."