Who's running the show? Survey shows growth rate of women and minority presidents slowing - Stats Watch

University Business, Feb, 2003 by Nicole Rivard

White Male. Married. Age 57. Doctorate Degree. Previously served as senior campus executive. This is the profile of a typical college president in 2001 according to "The American College President: 2002 Edition," a new survey released by the American Council on Education (www.acenet.edu).

And while women and minorities hold more college and university presidencies than ever before, the rate of growth of those positions has stowed in recent years. According to the report, the percentage of women college presidents more than doubled--from 9.5 percent in 1986 to 21.1 percent in 2001--while the percentage of minority presidents increased from 8.1 percent to 12.8 percent. However, over the Last three years, the percentage of women college presidents has increased only 1.8 percent; minority representation by just 1.5 percent.

Also noteworthy was that 15 percent of presidents' immediate prior positions were outside of higher education in 2001, up from 8 percent in 1998.

"We weren't expecting it to be as high as it was," says Melanie Corrigan, associate director of ACE's Center for Policy Analysis. "Increasingly, institutions are looking for leadership with financial backgrounds and other planning and development backgrounds because of the complexity of the institutions."

The survey also asked presidents whether they were given accurate information, financial or otherwise, about their prospective institution during the search process. "Twenty percent of the presidents thought they didn't have a full and accurate picture of the institutions when they arrived in the position," Corrigan says. "I do think it behooves both the search committee and the candidate to be as forthright as possible in sharing information."

Other highlights from the report, based on information received from 2,594 college and university presidents include:

* Women hold 27 percent of the presidencies at two-year colleges, up from 8 percent in 1986.

* Women hold 12 percent of the presidencies at doctorate-granting institutions, up from 4 percent in 1986.

* Minority presidents led virtually air historically black college and universities, and more than one-third of Hispanic-serving institutions. Excluding HBCUs and HSIs, the number of colleges and universities led by minority presidents drops from 12.8 percent to 10 percent, although that number is up from 4.7 percent in 1986.

* Women accounted for more than one-third of Hispanic presidents and one-quarter of African-American presidents, compared with 21 percent of white presidents.

* Almost half of African-American presidents and more than half of Hispanic presidents led schools with enrollments greater than 5,000, compared with less than 30 percent of white presidents.

* Search consultants were used to recruit more than half of recently hired presidents, up from 16 percent of those hired prior to 1985.

* Seventy percent of all new presidents were hired under a written contract. Thirty-seven percent of those contracts extended for three years.

* One-third of new presidents sought negotiating advice from someone prior to accepting an offer--typically a colleague in higher education, an attorney, or financial expert.