Event Detail

President Kenneth E. Young (1964)

Dr. Kenneth E. Young was the sixth president of SUNY Cortland, replacing acting president Ben Sueltz. Young was the youngest person to be appointed president when he took office in July of 1964. He was born in Toronto, and grew up in Oakland, California. Young earned his B.A. in Journalism from San Francisco State College and in 1953, and his M.A. and Ph.D. in higher education from Stanford University. Before coming to Cortland, Young taught journalism at San Francisco State, served as Acting Dean of Arts and Sciences at Cal Poly, Dean of Faculty at the University of Alaska, and Executive Vice President at the University of Nevada from 1960 until 1964.

During his short term as president, the school experienced rapid expansion. Enrollment grew from 2,800 to 3,600, the number of faculty expanded from 552 to 740, the budget increased by three million dollars, the main campus expanded to one hundred and forty five acres a with $30 million construction program, the campus facility at Raquette Lake expanded, and Hoxie Gorge Nature Preserve was acquired. The most visual impact of Young’s presidency can be seen in the many buildings constructed during his tenure including, Miller Administration Building, Dowd Fine Arts Center, Sperry Learning Resources Center, Winchell Dining Hall, Alger Hall, Higgins Hall, and Clack Hall. Under Young’s leadership, a long-range academic plan was developed along with new study abroad and graduate programs.

President Young’s longest lasting impact on the College was the shift from a teachers college to a liberal arts college. This change caused strife between him and the faculty as many felt that he undervalued the school’s historical commitment to teacher preparation, and gave too much priority to the liberal arts. Infamously during his tenure he established a committee to “examine the operation of my office and my roles as president.” Confident that an outside committee would exonerate of criticisms against him, he set this evaluation in motion. The report did afirm many of the complaints by the faculty but ultimately gave a positive conclusion, with committee member J. Murdoch Dawley stating “the strengths in the office of the Cortland presidency outweigh any weaknesses,” and “I believe that [Cortland’s] present difficulties and problems can be satisfactorily resolved, though this will take insight, determination, good communication, and good will.”

In 1968, President Young made a surprise announcement that he would resign at the end of the school year to become vice president and director of the Washington office of the American College Testing Program. Ken Young presidency was short in duration in but one of the most impactful in the school’s history.