Siena president to step down in 2020

Siena College President Br. F. Edward Coughlin, O.F.M., Ph.D., will step down next summer.

“It has been a great honor and at the same time a great challenge to serve Siena over the past five years during this key moment in our history,” said Br. Coughlin in a letter. “I am grateful for the many ways the Cabinet and so many others within our community have stepped up, embraced change, and leaned in through a shared desire to ensure the future vibrancy of the College.”

Br. Coughlin will end his tenure when his current three-year contract expires Aug. 31, 2020, the school announced Wednesday, June 26. Siena will then begin to develop a new strategic plan and engage in substantial fundraising for campus improvements designed to support students and accommodate new academic programs. 

“Given the transformative work ahead and the timeline required, the College must have a leader who can inaugurate this process then actively see it through over the next five to seven years, if not beyond,” said Br. Coughlin. “We have laid a strong foundation, and this is the right time to begin a search for a new leader for the next phase of Siena’s history. Be assured that I remain dedicated to leading the strategic work in front of us during the coming year.”

Brother Coughlin was named Siena's interim president in August 2014, when his predecessor, the Very Rev. Kevin J. Mullen, O.F.M. ‘75, was elected to lead the Franciscan friars of the Holy Name Province. Br. Coughlin was officially appointed the 11th president that November, and was formally inaugurated in a campus ceremony in October 2015.

Some of Brother Coughlin's accomplishments include:

• Siena is on track this fall to enroll one of the largest freshman classes in its history, with more than 800 incoming students.

• Introduced – and then expanded – the St. Francis Scholarship to ensure greater socioeconomic diversity among its student body. Twenty-seven percent of incoming freshmen will be eligible for a Pell Grant (family income of less than $50,000).

• Eight new majors and an MBA have been added in the past five years, more additions to academic programming than in any period since the founding of the College. The majors were strategically tied to student demand and purposefully connected to careers with strong hiring rates and potential growth, among them nursing, health studies and communications.

• Net total assets have grown by more than $35 million since 2013, raising the endowment to more than $130 million. The College experienced its largest non-campaign fundraising year ever in 2018-19, with gifts totaling more than $10 million.

• The Siena College Research Institute formed a ground-breaking partnership with The New York Times to track real-time political polling; the College opened the Breyo Observatory – which houses the third largest telescope in New York; and completed a $13.5 million renovation of the athletics facilities.

Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees Thomas J. Baldwin Jr. ’81 will assemble and chair a steering committee charged with organizing a presidential search with the assistance of an outside independent firm.