The Office of Assistant to the President operated from 1969 to 1985. The office was created by President Glenn Terrell, and filled by Dennis Morrison, who had functioned in a somewhat similar capacity when employed in the WSU News Service. Morrison held this position until his retirement in 1985, after which the office was discontinued. The office consisted of Morrison and one clerical employee.
The functions of the Assistant to the President were largely concerned with public relations, legislative and political liaison, fundraising, and intra-university communications.
Records of the Assistant to the President consist chiefly of subject files of correspondence and memoranda. They are arranged in several series of alphabetically ordered subject files. This arrangement follows the original order, but is changed to the degree that a quantity of unfiled material was incorporated into the same arrangement, and a number of folders were moved from scattered locations into proximity with others if the same logical series. Folder headings were supplied to a number of unlabeled folders.
Nine series are formed in this arrangement. The first, General Administration, deals with a wide variety of matters within the university. A Legislative and Political series is explained by it name. The Public Support and Salary Campaign deals with forming citizen groups for public and political support of university proposals; a large portion of these records deals with the Committee of 1000 of 1974, which conducted a campaign for salary increases at the state-supported colleges and universities.
A series called Glenn Terrell consists chiefly of speeches written by or for President Terrell. A Fundraising series concerns the early years of the WSU Foundation and the use of charitable remainder trusts or annuities in fundraising. The series titled University Publicity deals with dedications, public forums and similar events, and university involvement in Spokane's Expo 74.
A series called Student Concerns and Unrest deals largely with student activism in the years 1968-1970, and reflects Morrison's role as a university official with a direct assignment to deal with these matters. An eighth series, Correspondence, is a chronological file of letters sent by Morrison, retained without change in the original filing.
The records also include certain files associated with the Pullman School District, of which Morrison was a Director. Records concerning his involvement in the Washington State School Directors Association are also included. These are arranged as another series of records.
The Collection is open for research use.
The Washington State University Libraries received the records of the Office of the Assistant to the President in 1986 (accession number UA86-09), when the records were transferred by the Office of the President.
The records were arranged and described by Lawrence Stark in fall, 1992.