September 18, 2026

Vice President for Institutional Initiatives Search

Share on LinkedIn Share on Threads Share on Reddit Share via Email

Dear Colleagues,

It was great to see many of you recently at the State of the University event. I’m excited about the coming year and look forward to making progress on the many initiatives before us. As I said in my remarks, the work ahead is focused on strengthening the people and programs that make RIT distinctive, expanding opportunity for our students, and ensuring that RIT can continue to deliver on its mission and vision for generations to come.

We will accomplish these goals by operationalizing our framework to make concrete changes in how RIT operates. It’s clear to me that RIT’s value proposition is much stronger in total than the sum of the value of its parts. To deliver that value, we need to be strategic, creative, and collaborative - working together across colleges, divisions, and other organizational boundaries. Working together in that way requires strong collaboration, transparency, accountability, and disciplined execution, and to facilitate that, I am launching a search for a Vice President for Institutional Initiatives.

Reporting directly to the President, this position combines strategic vision with operational execution, ensuring that institute-wide vision and priorities are translated into actions with measurable outcomes that advance the University's mission, growth, innovation, and long-term sustainability. Serving as a trusted strategic partner, integrator, and catalyst for action, the Vice President will provide executive-level leadership, counsel, and implementation support to the President and university leadership. Through influence, partnership, and results-oriented leadership, the Vice President will foster progress on the university's most consequential opportunities and challenges and help create the financial capacity to invest in what matters most while keeping RIT strong for the future.

To help me recruit this person, I am thankful that the following people have agreed to serve on a search advisory committee to identify finalists:

  • Karen Barrows, Chief of Staff
  • David Brault, Director, Tait Preserve and Chair, Staff Council
  • Prabu David, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
  • Sandra Johnson, Senior Vice President, Student Affairs
  • Susan Puglia, Chair, Board of Trustees
  • Chris Regis, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
  • Richard Zanibbi, Professor, Computer Science and Chair, Faculty Senate

We will be supported by John Muckle, Liz Braun, and Ethan Thomas from Isaacson, Miller in the search. The search will be launched in the coming weeks, and we hope to have a person in place by the new year.  

I know the chosen individual will be instrumental in helping us make progress on our shared initiatives while positioning the University to thrive in an increasingly competitive and rapidly changing higher education landscape.

Sincerely, 

Bill

William H. Sanders
President