(Editor’s Note: Following are portions of a longer interview that Dr. David Norman granted to the Inside Higher Education Web Magazine.)

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(President Elect David) Norman said he has been interested in a career in higher education administration since he was an undergraduate, and long thought about Erskine
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He expressed confidence that the controversies that have engulfed the college for the last year “are not insurmountable,” and said he believed that he could work with all sides.
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Facing all of this turmoil, Norman said he believes common ground can be found. “I know some very fine people on both sides of the situation…My goal is to take a long view.”

Perhaps taking that long view, he declined to comment directly on the various allegations and counter-allegations made, but said he believes it is possible for Erskine to stay true to church teachings and to teach evolution. (Some outside critics have suggested otherwise.)

“I believe in a historical Adam and Eve, and I believe that a historical Adam and Eve is a position that any high quality theologian will consider a fact, but I also recognize that most of the top biologists in the Western world would consider some form of evolution to be a fact, and I think all facts are God’s facts,” he said. Asked if that means he is comfortable with evolution being taught at the college, he said yes, without hesitation.

Read entire interview here:
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/05/26/erskine