After a decade of service at Cornell University, Vice President for Financial Affairs and University Controller Yoke San Reynolds will depart Cornell this May to become the University of Virginia’s vice president for finance.
“I’m really sorry to be leaving Cornell,” Reynolds said in a news release. “However, the opportunity to become the chief business officer at the number one public institution in the country is a wonderful professional advancement and an opportunity I simply could not pass up.”
Reynolds came to Cornell in 1991 from the State University of New York at Albany, where she served as assistant vice president for financial management and director of budget. She began at Cornell as University controller and was named associate vice president and University controller in 1996.
Two years later, she was promoted to her current position as vice president for financial affairs and University controller. There, she assumed responsibility for developing and implementing financial regulations, overseeing financial receipts and disbursements, negotiating with the government over research indirect costs, and contracting with vendors that supply Cornell.
While at Cornell, Reynolds oversaw the merger of the financial operations for the endowed and statutory colleges. After leaving, she will be remembered for her leadership and her many accomplishments.
“She took people of different cultures and put them in one office and was very successful,” said Acting Controller Joanne DeStefano MBA ’97, who will be taking up Reynolds’s responsibilities until a replacement is found.
Reynolds instituted a program called TOPS, “Transforming Our Organization and Our People,” which had a “main focus