By Bill Knief
The phrase “a gentleman and a scholar ” certainly applies to Jim Gilroy, who for the past eight years has served as UNM-Taos Dean of Instruction and is retiring to write, read and work on his home and land in San Cristobal, NM, a small community north of Taos.
A true renaissance man, Jim Gilroy has studied, taught and worked on agricultural development projects in numerous places across the United States and Latin America. He went from attending a Jesuit high school and studying philosophy at Gonzaga University in Washington to teaching in Peru, providing political asylum to friends in Chile during the Pinochet regime, obtaining a master’s degree in agricultural sciences and finally locating in Taos with His wife Mary where he taught biology and earth sciences for 20 years at Taos High school.
While at UNM-Taos Gilroy built the highly successful dual credit and nursing programs and the science department, improved developmental and green jobs programs and guided the college through a reorganization that transformed the department of instruction. Always a strong supporter of the community college mission of providing quality, affordable, accessible education to the underserved populations in small, multicultural, rural New Mexico communities, Gilroy maintains that, “What is going to be critical to future economic development in our state is the quality of our schools.”
At this year’s graduation ceremonies Mayor Darren Cordova declared May 11 Jim Gilroy Day throughout the community.
