Among North American campuses within the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU) alone, 27 new presidents have been inaugurated since January 2006. Of the 14 new CCCU presidents taking office between January 2007 and February 2008, eight of them are between 40 and 50 years old. (Click here to see new presidents at CCCU institutions since January 2006.)

The changing face of Christian higher education
The new class of CCCU leadership describe themselves as having a high comfort-level with technology and interactive media, transparent and open style of communication, global focus, and willingness to seek help and advice. While presidents of an older generation can be marked by these traits as well, these seem to be consistent hallmarks of new presidents.

“As a young president, I have a lot to learn, so I deeply value those who are older and wiser than me,” says Greg Christy, age 40, president of Northwestern College (IA) since January 2008. “I’ll be looking for folks who can be mentors for me.”

“That’s very different from when I started,” says Belhaven College (MS) president Roger Parrott, age 53, currently in his 19th year as a CCCU president. Parrott was 34 years old when he first became a college president at Sterling College (KS). “There was an expectation in the past that, ‘Now that you’re president you shouldn’t ask for help, and have to know everything.’ There’s a good, teachable spirit I really like seeing in the new generation of the presidency.”

Barry Corey was 46 when he was inaugurated as Biola University’s (CA) new president in July 2007. “People said, ‘You’re awfully young to be a president,’ but this is the age my predecessor, Clyde Cook was when he assumed this role in 1982. Certainly, in choosing younger presidents to lead their institutions, many boards are hoping there will be longevity, which can be good for the institution.” 

Corey adds that, as with any new group of leaders, regardless of generation, “There is a sense of imagination, courage, and a willingness to take some bold initiatives that is inherent to those of us who see ourselves in the meat of our careers with a couple decades left to go.”

Henry Smith, 57, president of Indiana Wesleyan University (IN) since July 2006, is eager to collaborate. “The changing of the guard allows lots of us to forge new partnerships and new relationships that may or may not have existed in the past,” he says. “We need to collaborate more, work together more.  It’s a challenge, because in a sense, higher education is so competitive. Part of it is getting together, meeting each other, putting a face with an institution, drinking coffee, going to sessions together, but it’s more than that. It’s being willing to collaborate in programs for students, leadership training, benchmarking studies and more.”

Charles Pollard, 44, has been president of John Brown University (AR) since 2004. With college-age children of his own, he is very in tune with this age group and interactive with students on campus, playing intramural games and teaching a class each year. “Some of that has more to do with the personality and training of the president rather than age,” he admits.

A lively connection with the campus community seems to be a common theme for the younger set or presidents. Forty-one year-old Daniel Martin, president of Mount Vernon Nazarene University (OH) since February 2007, says, “Presidents from more recent generations have more outlets to connect to current students, young alumni, young faculty, etc., while sharing similar perspectives, cultural influences, and expectations.”

Robin Baker, 50, president of George Fox University (OR) since July 2007, agrees. “The younger generation is more likely to have a positive relationship – relationship being the key word – with faculty and students. Influenced, in part, by the increasing number of women in leadership, our cultural norms and expectations have changed.  We are being asked to be more relational, more transparent, and more connected than in the past. I do not believe that this change is the result of any intrinsic values in the younger generation, but a part of the shift in communication and expectation in our culture. ” Baker goes on to clarify that personality trumps age when it comes to relating to students. For example, Jay Kesler, former president of Taylor University (IN), is considered by many to have been one of the most involved presidents with students.

Kim Phipps, 49, has been president of Messiah College (PA) since December 2004 and hopes to see more female presidents at CCCU institutions. Of the 105 CCCU member campuses, three other presidents besides Phipps are women: Sandra Gray at Asbury College (KY), inaugurated in July 2007; Corlis McGee at Eastern Nazarene College (MA), inaugurated in July 2005; and Shirley Mullen at Houghton College, inaugurated in June 2006.

“We’re hoping to see broadly within church and within Christian higher education a real affirmation of women who have the gifts of leadership,” says Phipps. “As presidents, we feel responsibility to set positive examples as women leaders.”

Despite all the characteristics that may be more specific to the new presidents, one thing, they say, will remain the same: the mission of their institutions. “Our Christ-centered mission is not up for negotiation,” says Dale Lunsford, 47, president of LeTourneau University (TX) since July 2007. “Hiring a new president was the opportunity for our board to stand up and say this is who we are and who we will continue to be.” Lunsford points out that having earned his Ph.D.  and worked in secular institutions, he experienced an environment where one is not free to bring faith into the classroom. “I have a very enthusiastic commitment to our faith mission here. I’m thankful and excited about the opportunity to really be Christ-centered.”

Challenges & opportunities
Certain challenges lie ahead for all presidents of CCCU schools, which are more tied to the current culture than to the specific age of the leaders.

“We must do a better job preparing students to live, work and serve in an interfaith world,” says Phipps. “We have to do more to prepare them to have hospitable conversations with those who don’t embrace our faith, or who embrace other faiths. We need to avoid having a defensive posture about Christian higher education but and seek to emphasize the positives of what we bring to broader culture.” Phipps notes that presidents today have increased pressure to be responsive not only to students, staff, faculty and donors, but to the public, as well.

“With all the complexities of accreditation, government regulation, the messiness of the business of higher education, the role of president is much more strategic and complex than it has been in previous years,” says Edwin Robinson, 56, president of MidAmerica Nazarene University since July 2005. “It won’t just be about visionary leadership and being what I call the ‘university icon’ in the public. In part, it’s fundraising, but it’s more than that. The president needs to help the university be more fluid in its ability to respond and react to circumstances, but doing it without giving away spiritual strength and mission stability.”

Corey agrees. “There needs to be intentional discussion and deep thoughtful reflection on what it means to hold tightly to the convictions of institutions that are time-honored, while leading with courage and imagination into the future,” he says. “That’s the tension.  If we simply stay who we always were, we are increasingly irrelevant to global realities unfolding before us. If we shed our past entirely, we become untethered to core convictions of the institution. I call it living between conviction and courage; conviction to the past, courage to move into the future.”

Other challenges facing CCCU presidents, according to Smith, include financial aid and keeping tuition affordable, hiring rights, and responding to shifting demographics with new models of education. “A lot of people were fearful of drifting away from our Christ-centered purpose when it came to venturing into the arena of adult education,” he says. “There were notions of schools prostituting themselves by catering to adult market and not giving purpose to it. But we still have a mission with our adult education. Adults in their mid-30s are often coming back and asking some of the same questions about life. They have children, aging parents. They are at a crossroads, and ripe to be ministered to. It’s different but it can be a ministry. We need to struggle with issue of changing demographics (i.e. adult education).”

Gary Streit, 62, president of Malone College (OH) since July 2007, says there will be changing demands on higher education institutions. “With tuition escalating, the whole question of accessibility of Christian higher education to those audiences for whom it is most designed is a major issue we’ll have to face,” he says. “We have to be creative, entrepreneurial and innovative to find solutions. Boards of governance are absolutely key. The future is bright. I have not one negative inclination or feeling about the Christian higher education movement. We’re growing, developing and learning all the time about ourselves. It’s an exciting time to be part of Christian higher education.

What’s the difference?
George Fox University President Robin Baker discusses the implications of a younger set of CCCU presidents:

Leadership is always generationally and culturally construed. We are products not only of our church and theological life, but also of our culture. Here are five implications as I see them:

1. Most of the present generation does not hold onto the denominational distinctives of the past. It is much more important to determine what makes us Christian at the core than to focus on what divides us or makes us unique among Christians. This generation should be more concerned about collaboration and cooperation than denominational ascendancy.

2. The present generation is affected by a culture increasingly disenchanted with the organized religion. Present leadership, whether young or old, will have to face significant challenges from the gay, transgendered and transsexual communities, which desire to be recognized as normative. The new leadership needs to determine what is really core to Christian commitment and hold to those commitments in the face of cultural animosity.

3. The leadership of the Christian movement will become increasingly global. It will become paramount for university leaders to move outside of the confines of their communities and to create a truly global agenda for students and leaders of the university.

4. This generation must learn to communicate in different forms than the past and to be more accessible to students and the community. Facebook and MySpace accounts will become normative for leaders rather than the exception. Leaders will be comfortable with all types of electronic communication and immediate access to leadership will also be normative.

5. The present leadership is far more transparent and less hierarchical than in the past. This is a cultural phenomenon rather than better qualities inherent in a younger generation. The new generation of leaders will also have to be more comfortable with gender and the inclusion of diverse people groups in the leadership of the university and the church. Christian higher education and the Church will change significantly in the years ahead -- but it always has done so. You either find a way to encounter culture or you react against it and eventually die.

The Council for Christian Colleges & Universities is a higher education association of 182 intentionally Christ-centered institutions around the world. There are now 105 member campuses in North America and all are fully-accredited, comprehensive colleges and universities with curricula rooted in the arts and sciences. In addition, 77 affiliate campuses from 24 countries are part of the CCCU. The Council’s mission is to advance the cause of Christ-centered higher education and to help its institutions transform lives by faithfully relating scholarship and service to biblical truth.

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