Every year, New York is one of the top-ranked destinations where foreign students would like to live, travel, or study. While New York is primarily known for finance, New York has the nation’s largest public education system called SUNY (State University of New York). Across the state, there are 64 SUNY campuses, CUNY (City University of New York), and prestigious colleges that include Cornell, Columbia, and New York universities. cityandstateny.com which covers New York City and New York State issues recently announced The 2020 Higher Education Power 50 list. In the list, you can find the most influential college and university leaders in New York State including Jim Malatras who has been appointed as a SUNY chancellor since August 2020.
What would be the common theme of these influential presidents and chancellors? Taking several factors into accounts: previous roles, nationality, and well-known initiatives, the most prevalent theme of these leaders is that they either have culturally diverse backgrounds or have committed to diversity. From the vantage point that leaders’ initiatives can impact colleges’ admission to graduation to a greater degree, this post will take a look at presidents and chancellors of New York.
Contents
- Previous roles of higher ed leaders in NY
- Nationality of higher ed leaders in NY
- Commitment to the diversity
Previous roles of higher ed leaders in NY
Where would 50 leaders have been before they come to the New York state? In searching, around 45% of presidents and chancellors had worked in post-secondary education. Another 20% of college leaders also had work experiences where they performed teaching and administering for many years. It can be interpreted that since university leaders should have a deep understanding of how the college works, it is pretty common to appoint someone who has already been in a similar position.
On the other hand, when it comes to military schools, law schools and journalism schools, top experts in the field were chosen to serve the college as a leader.
Nationality of higher ed leaders in NY
Amongst 50 leaders in New York, around 76% were Americans while 24% have international backgrounds. For example, powerful higher education leaders who have international backgrounds are from Australia, United Kingdom (British American), China, Dominican Republic, Serbia, India, Philippines, Puerto Rico, Switzerland, Taiwan. More often than not, these international leaders tend to be the first leaders who serve each school as non-Americans. In the same vein, there were leaders who are from underrepresented groups in America. In other words, some are the first Latino or Black leaders in the long history of their institutions. The list of examples can be found the table below.
| Name | Current Role | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Félix Matos Rodríguez | Chancellor, City University of New York | The first Latino chancellor of the nation’s largest urban public university system |
| Havidán Rodríguez | President, University at Albany | The first Latino president of a SUNY college |
| Dwight McBride | President, The New School | The first Black president in the 100-year history of The New School |
| Darryl Williams | Superintendent, United States Military Academy at West Point | The first African American officer to lead the famed military academy in its 216-year history |
| S. David Wu | President, Baruch College | The first Asian American to be named president of a City University of New York campus |
| Conrado “Bobby” Gempesaw | President, St. John’s University | The first Filipino American and layperson |
| Frank Wu | President, Queens College | The first Asian American to hold the position |
| Daisy Cocco De Filippis | Interim President, Hostos Community College | The first Dominican woman to lead the school |
Among the Higher Education Power 50 in NY, female leaders can be found as well and 10% of them were first woman to lead the higher education institution.
| Name | Current Role | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Shirley Ann Jackson | President, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute | The first Black woman to receive a doctorate from MIT |
| Jelena Kovačević | Dean, NYU Tandon School of Engineering | The first woman to head NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering in its 164-year history |
| Laura Sparks | President, The Cooper Union | The first woman to serve as president of The Cooper Union |
| Karol Mason | President, John Jay College of Criminal Justice | The first woman and African American president to lead the John Jay College of Criminal Justice |
| Milagros Peña | President, Purchase College | The first Hispanic female president to lead Purchase College |
Commitment to the diversity
The article The 2020 Higher Education Power 50 also shares initiatives of higher education leaders and their focus areas. Although it is not the full list of initiatives or commitments of NY presidents and chancellors, it turns out that around 70% of leaders showed their commitment to diversity. Increasing diversity and inclusion has been very important concept especially in American higher education. For example, colleges and universities aim to recruit students from different socio-economic levels, and different countries. In the same perspective, to advise and teach these diverse group of students, higher education leaders also focus on increasing faculty diversity in their institutions.
Some of the examples of how each president or chancellor is taking the lead to increase the diversity can be found below.
| Name | Current Role | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Shirley Ann Jackson | President, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute | Jackson has established herself as one of the nation’s leading advocates for women and minorities in science. |
| Karol Mason | President, John Jay College of Criminal Justice | Mason has pledged to increase faculty diversity and initiate dialogue around race and policing. |
| Rudy Crew | President, Medgar Evers College | One of Crew’s signature initiatives has been a pipeline program designed to help underserved K-12 students transition into college. |
| Michelle Anderson | President, Brooklyn College | Anderson has made inclusiveness a central theme on campus |
| Jelena Kovačević | Dean, NYU Tandon School of Engineering | Kovacevic is known for her commitment to advancing women in STEM fields. |
| Greg Morrisett | Dean and Vice Provost, Cornell Tech | Morrisett recently introduced Break Through Tech, a program designed to make it easier for women to enter into STEM fields. |
| Brian Casey | President, Colgate University | Casey announced a comprehensive review of the school’s diversity and inclusion practices |
| David Wippman | President, Hamilton College | When he stepped into his role as president of Hamilton College in 2016, David Wippman announced that campus diversity would be a priority |
| Teresa Miller | Officer-in-Charge, SUNY Old Westbury | Miller was the driving force behind an initiative designed to increase faculty diversity and inclusion on campus. |
In this blog post, commonalities of the most influential higher ed leaders in NY have been discussed. Although It does not directly impact students, many international students will be affected indirectly in the long term. In this sense, it is great that majority leaders are committed to ensuring diversity and inclusion on campus. Do you see these initiatives on your campus? Please feel free to share what you have observed if you are enrolled in one of the featured colleges in this post.
