President of Fieldstone Consulting, Inc.®, Dr. William A. Weary works strategy with colleges, universities, schools, associations, governmental bodies, churches, and other nonprofit groups around the country and the world. Services include facilitation, assessment, planning, governance, and transition management. Nearly 300 institutions have been served since 1994 and Fieldstone Consulting's founding. He has been a full-time consultant for 23 years.

A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Amherst College, Dr. Weary holds both master's and doctoral degrees in history from Yale University. He taught European history at Amherst and Bowdoin Colleges, did research on early modern France as a graduate fellow at the University of Wisconsin's Institute for Research in the Humanities, and headed the upper schools of Abington Friends School in Philadelphia and the Dalton School in New York City. After leaving Dalton, he worked for some years at Independent School Management (DE).

In addition to his ongoing consulting work in higher education, Bill has, each year since 1995, led the workshop on presidential and board assessment at the National Conference on Trusteeship of the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges (AGB). Bill has served as director of the former AGB Presidential Search Consultation Service and interim director of AGB Board Education Services, and continues to work with AGB on special consulting assignments.

As a consultant to AGB, Bill has developed its presidential search workshop, designed and coordinated its presidential and board assessment service, written its Essentials of Presidential Search and Guidelines on Selecting a Presidential Search Consultant, and, in 2000, with AGB's president, published Presidential and Board Assessment in Higher Education: Purposes, Policies & Strategies. In 2005-06, he assisted AGB's incoming president in preparation of the Association's new strategic plan.

A chapter on the role of the board in presidential transitions figures within James Martin and James E. Samel, eds., Presidential Transition in Higher Education: Managing Leadership Change, (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004). One on the role of the board in institutions "at risk" appears in their forthcoming volume on that subject. In the spring of 2006, for The Chronicle of Higher Education's conference on the state of the academic presidency, Bill served on the panel addressing presidential assessment. In the fall of 2007, he delivered an address on best practice in governance to the association of board chairs of Spanish universities, in Cordoba.

In conjunction with his consulting to independent schools, Bill has spoken at the 1996, 1997, 1999, and 2004 annual conferences of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), and has regularly delivered keynote addresses for state, regional, and other associations of independent schools. In 1999, he assisted NAIS in preparation of its transformational strategic plan, in 2000, that for the International Boys' School Coalition, and in 2006, one for the Southern Association of Independent Schools.

Bill has served on the boards of Friends World College (NY), Hebron Academy (ME), and Wilmington Friends School (DE).