When a college transitions from one president to another, is there any impact on admissions? If the leadership of an institution is in transition, I wonder if there are immediate effects and whether the admissions goals are impacted in any way. Specifically, Rice, Lafayette, and Carleton are changing presidents and on our radar for next year. I would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks!
Shouldn’t have any impact. Absent any sort of cataclysmic upheaval having triggered the departure of the previous president, the first thing on the agenda for any new University President is fund raising, followed by fund raising and… fund raising. Tinkering with admissions is well down the list.
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I cannot answer your question, but would like to share that I think Northwestern University will soon be getting a new president due to impending retirement of Morty Shapiro (who came from Williams College) in about 14 months (August 31, 2022).
President Shapiro was great, but he argued a bit with US News and that has held back Northwestern’s US News ranking (currently tied at ninth behind #8 UPenn). If Northwestern moves up in the rankings, then admissions will be affected due to an increase in applications & probably an increase in yield.
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@Publisher Thanks, interesting and realistic projection. NU is on our radar too, but it sounds like the timing won’t effect 2022.
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@tdy123 Ha, gotcha. That makes sense. From what I understand, Lafayette is bringing in a president who is well-versed in fundraising. I remember reading somewhere that admissions can be easier during a time of transition, but I could be wrong. Maybe overall goals… financial, URM, Bipoc, etc… are subject to change,
depending on the philosophy of the incoming president?
If the new president wants the college to climb rankings, part of that process typically involves attracting stronger applicants to make admissions more competitive. But that tends to be a multi-year project.
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I imagine new presidents were hired because the Board of Trustees feel they have the skills needed to help to advance the established long term goals of the college. I don’t expect new college presidents to impact admissions in a significant way.
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At least Carleton already has its president. She’ll be laying out her agenda over the next year or more and seems pretty dynamic. Carleton’s 2,069 total students is 43% of the size of where Rice wants to grow its student body by 2025 – total of 4,800. That growth and new residential colleges will slightly improve one’s chances but it’s already a super hard admit.
While the others are undergoing searches, the university missions would basically be on auto-pilot with continued fundraising for key initiatives and seeing past plans come to fruition.
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What everyone else said. University Presidents/Chancellors do not have immediate impacts on well established schools.
If you want to know how a university is trending, look at its balance sheet from 2019 and compare it to where it was a decade before.
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