Press Releases

Original Naropa CEO and World Class Businessman Join University’s Board of Trustees

Boulder, Colo. (Nov 14, 2008)—Naropa University is pleased to announce the appointment of two members to its board of trustees, former Naropa CEO and vice president John J. Baker and Texture Media CEO Andrew B. Davison. Both Baker and Davison have a long history of innovation in their respective fields, and the board is confident in their ability to further Naropa University’s growth and evolution.

According to Marty Janowitz, chair of the board of trustees, “These two new appointments strengthen the board in wonderfully complementary ways. John Baker played a central role in launching Naropa University as its first executive officer, and he now brings his many years of experience in the metropolitan New York area as a counselor and meditation teacher back to the institution he helped found. Andrew Davison has had a long-standing interest in contemplative thought and education, with deep involvement with NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School). The online brand-building skills he developed as founder of Boulder-based Texturemedia will clearly be very helpful as we set about implementing Naropa’s new strategic plan.”

Baker, after completing his graduate and undergraduate work in Eastern language and civilization, met Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche in 1970. At the time he held a teaching position on the New York Board of Education and was developing a program that would ease the transition of newly arrived Chinese children. Following that initial meeting, Baker and his wife decided to move to Boulder to study with Trungpa Rinpoche. It’s here that he co-founded the Karma Dzong Boulder Shambhala Meditation Center, became the first CEO and Vice President of the Naropa Institute and lectured on Buddhist Psychology and meditation, as well as co-edited Trungpa’s books Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism and The Myth of Freedom. Baker taught at Naropa until 1978 when he shifted his attention to THOR Inc., a business providing marketing services to travel agencies that he co-founded with his father, Edward J. Baker. By 1999, THOR had become a leader in internet hotel reservations, and it was then they decided to sell the business to the Trip Network. The technology they developed during their ownership continues to be used today by popular websites such as Orbitz and CheapTickets.com.

Andrew Davison has a long history of successful, innovative entrepreneurship. As the founder of Texture Media, which won two prestigious Webby Awards in 2008, he has worked with a diverse range of companies to create integrated marketing campaigns and web technology solutions. Handling both new technology start-ups and Fortune 500 companies, Texture Media has been cited as one of the 100 fastest growing companies by Entrepreneur Magazine. In June of 2008, Crispin Porter & Bogusky (CP+B)—a global marketing and advertising agency based in Boulder, Miami, Los Angeles, and London— acquired Texture Media. Andrew is still working with Texture Media in a leadership and strategic capacity. In addition to his business pursuits, he has also cultivated a love of the outdoors as a guide and wilderness educator at the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS). He has been a student, field instructor and fundraiser and now currently serves on their advisory board. He and his wife Brooke also founded the Front Range Scholarship committee and have successfully raised a number of endowment scholarships for low-income students.     

Accredited by the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, Naropa University is a private, nonprofit, nonsectarian liberal arts institution dedicated to advancing contemplative education. This approach to learning integrates the best of Eastern and Western educational traditions, helping students know themselves more deeply and engage constructively with others. The university comprises a four-year undergraduate college and graduate programs in the arts, education, environmental leadership, psychology and religious studies.