Worcester Business Journal

12 Worcester Business Journal | July 26, 2021 | wbjournal.com W hen students return to campus at Nichols College this fall, they will be greeted by a new face: Glenn Sulmasy, who began his term July 1 as president of the institution in Dudley. Sulmasy, who previously served as the provost and chief academic officer at EXPANDING the Nichols brand Bryant University in Rhode Island, was chosen by a search committee in March to be the eighth president of Nichols College. As he steps into his new role, Sulmasy plans to address the challenges of the turbulent field of higher education by increasing outreach and expanding the Nichols brand beyond Central Mas- sachusetts, including internationally. "It's critically important to put the word out about Nichols," said Sulmasy. "Internally we know our worth, but being a secret success is no longer prac- ticable in this state of higher education. e key is that words matter, and I want to clearly communicate as president that this is the business school of choice." One component of growing Nichols' name recognition is the college's plan to seek accreditation from the Associ- ation to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business by the 2022-2023 academic year, a process involving documenting a commitment to business education and hiring employees with terminal educa- tional qualifications. Additionally, Sulmasy said marketing alumni outcomes in job placement and graduate school offers as critical to the ability to prevent the statewide trend of declining student enrollment from oc- curring at Nichols, where enrollment fell 7.8% from the 2018 to 2019 fall semester but rose 17% from 2019 to 2020. "One component of the return on in- vestment on a Nichols degree is experi- ential learning. Employers want to have an opportunity to have people come who are prepared to work," said Sulmasy. "My job in the next six months is to find the needs of the business community in Worcester. We want to build a relation- ship by having our students go work for them in an internship." Fighting an enrollment decline While the COVID-19 pandemic sharply dropped the rate of first-year entrants to college in 2020, the plummet follows years of declining enrollment. According to the Massachusetts Depart- ment of Higher Education, public higher education enrollment has decreased by roughly 2% each year since 2015. Aer 2025, first-year enrollment rates are ex- pected to fall even further as the signifi- cantly smaller age cohort born aer the Great Recession applies for university. "e pandemic has accelerated the challenges that were already coming. We had demographic challenges that insti- tutions of higher education were already facing prior to the pandemic that have accelerated," said Francesco Cesareo, president of Assumption University. "It has forced institutions to prepare more proactively for the challenges we will see further down the road." Sulmasy emphasized equipping students with new training as a compo- nent of meeting the evolving needs of the workplace and competition among college graduates to secure employment. "e [certified public accountant] exam will require analytics by 2024, and accounting firms aren't going to hire anyone who doesn't have that back- ground," said Sulmasy. "All students are going to need to have some exposure to data science regardless of what field they are going into. e goal is for us to be re- alistic. We want to provide every student PHOTO/MATT WRIGHT Get to know Glenn Sulmasy • Began his term as Nichols College president on July 1 • Previously a law professor focusing on national security and constitutional and international law • Educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law, University of California Berkeley School of Law, and the Harvard Kennedy School • Has seven children • Served as a visiting fellow at the National Security Law Institute at George Mason University School of Law in Virginia Source: Nichols College e new Nichols College president seeks to decode the rising crisis in higher education DEVAN GREEVY Worcester Business Journal Editorial Intern I N N O V AT I O N & H I G H E R E D U C AT I O N FOCUS Nichols enrollment Full-time enrollment of undergraduate and graduate students 0 300 600 900 1,200 1,500 2014 '15 '16 '17 '18 '19 '20 1,260 1,458 Source: Nichols College

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