Event Detail

President Judson H. Taylor (1995)

President Judson H. Taylor arrived to Cortland with decades of experience in higher education, and like his predecessor, significant international work and travel. A Portland, Oregon, native, Taylor received his undergraduate degree and M.Ed. in education and counseling from the University of Oregon and his Ph.D. in educational psychology from Arizona State. He spent more than two decades as a faculty member and administrator at California State University, Dominguez Hills. He then became provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Wisconsin, River Falls before becoming SUNY Cortland’s ninth president on July 1, 1995. During his career, Taylor traveled extensively, including a period as a school psychologist with the Department of Defense schools in Japan, a two-year assignment as a USAID evaluation consultant in the Ministry of Education and Culture in Brazil, a six-month visiting professorship at the Boston University World Bank project in Lisbon, Portugal, and as a Fulbright Scholar working with Portugal’s Ministry of Education and Culture. He also completed a Portuguese language program at the Foreign Service Institute in Washington D.C., which allowed him to work effectively in Brazil and Portugal.  

Taylor’s experience with assessment and long-range planning led to his early introduction of a new Review and Restructuring Process (RRP) that resulted in a set of eight goals Taylor used to prioritize the College’s allocation of resources: to provide curricular programs attractive to new students that meet societal needs; to implement College-wide assessment; to infuse technology across the College; to plan for anticipated enrollment growth; to increase student and faculty diversity; to improve understanding of diversity on campus; to attract and retain adult learners through relevant academic programming and support services; to enhance and support instructional innovation; and to expand the College’s financial resources and ensure fiscal stability. These goals defined Taylor’s administrative priorities. 

By the time Taylor retired in 2003, the College had built a $5 million reserve fund by requiring that 2 percent of annual budgets were set aside. He also established a new Enrollment Management unit that honed recruitment and outreach. In addition, Taylor focused attention on alumni and public relations by appointing James J. Boyle in 1996 to head the newly organized Institutional Advancement Office, which included alumni affairs, public relations and fundraising. Within four years of Boyle’s arrival, the College launched its first and highly successful $10 million capital campaign, increasing annual support for merit and need-based student scholarships from $100,000 to $800,000. Taylor also worked with Boyle’s division to refashion the College’s brand, and he focused on improving community relations and regional economic development. The new $18 million stadium complex played a major role in this work by attracting such sports and tourist-related events as the Empire State Senior and Empire State games.An additional area of emphasis included attention to grant writing spearheaded by the Sponsored Programs Office, directed by Amy Henderson-Harr ’83. From 1995 to 2003 grant activity increased from $1.2 million to $3 million with 25 percent of the full-time teaching faculty participating. The increased emphasis on sponsored activity pushed SUNY Cortland from twelfth to fifth among the thirteen SUNY comprehensive colleges ranked by annual grant expenditures. 

In 1998, Taylor combined his commitment to diversity with the state’s need for qualified teachers in urban districts and created the Cortland Urban Recruitment of Educators Program (C.U.R.E.). Funded by the Ford Foundation and an anonymous donor, twelve minority students received full four-year scholarships in exchange for a two-year commitment to teach in an inner-city school following graduation. Assistant Professor Michelle Kelly, education, became the first C.U.R.E. coordinator. She introduced field observations for first-year C.U.R.E. students in partnership with Syracuse City School District’s Blodgett Elementary School. She also created a course in urban education and multiculturalism to prepare C.U.R.E. students to address issues of institutionalized racism and poverty in public schools. C.U.R.E. students quickly became highly visible campus leaders and the reputation of the program grew. 

Throughout his administration, Taylor encouraged faculty and staff to expand their involvement in community organizations and many did. Several members of the administration, including Taylor, were members of Rotary. College members volunteered with the YMCA, YWCA, ZONTA, the League of Women Voters and other local political and service organizations. Students also volunteered and pursued internships with local agencies.