text: Corson led the university through the final years of the Vietnam War and student activism, and through the economic recession of the 1970s. His role was to return the university to stability: to concentration on research, teaching, and scholarship.
  Corson brought together the state and endowed components of Cornell, forming one university enjoying public and private support, as envisioned by White and Cornell and articulated by Jacob Gould Schurman. Significant support was provided for the research programs at Arecibo, the Wilson Synchrotron Laboratory, and the establishment in 1977 of the National Research and Resource Facility for Submicron Structures (NRRFSS). He revitalized the Department of Geology, expanded the Division of Biological Sciences, and added new programs, such as Medieval studies. The I.M. Pei-designed Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art was completed. He encouraged such multidisciplinary programs as Science, Technology, and Society, the Materials Science Center, environmental programs, radio physics, and space research.
  The status of women on campus was greatly improved during the Corson presidency. A Womens Studies Program was formally established in 1972. A Provosts Advisory Committee on the Status of Women was created and presented specific recommendations. The university's policy statement on equal opportunity was changed to include gender among the proscribed criteria with regard to admission to the university. New employment procedures were implemented, and increasing numbers of women were appointed to the faculty and to high administrative positions. Corson provided support for the Africana Studies and Research Center, which had developed from the black studies movement. He recommended the formation of an Affirmative Action Advisory Board to monitor the status of women and minorities and to propose more effective procedures.
  During his presidency, university governance was overhauled including the establishment of a faculty-student-employee University Senate and the addition of Student and Employee representatives to the board of trustees.  A new campus judicial system and campus code of conduct were established.