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Dear Campus Community,

As we close another remarkable academic year at the ÍÃ×ÓÏÈÉú, I would like to take a moment to celebrate our collective accomplishments, share some updates about our ongoing work advocating for higher education, and preview the academic year ahead.

None of this year’s impressive milestones would have been possible without your dedication, creativity, and commitment to our university. Thank you for making Puget Sound such a vibrant and transformative place.

CLASS OF 2025
It has been an honor to witness the growth, resilience, and extraordinary achievements of our Class of 2025. They embody the very best of what it means to be a Logger — a community defined by curiosity, compassion, and connection.

Their legacy of service shines through partnerships with the Tacoma Neighborhood Clinic, Habitat for Humanity, and our Food Salvage Program. Their individual stories inspire us all—from Iliana Barnes Diaz, recipient of the Governor’s Award for Civic Engagement; to Kevoni Neely, our inspiring  ASUPS immediate past president and Commencement speaker; to Andrew Benoit, Convocation speaker and editor of The Trail; to Josh Cunningham, a Lillis Scholar whose summer research embodied the spirit and the nature of the liberal arts; to Conner Kankelborg, who has worked to address long standing disparities in healthcare for Indigenous people; and countless others. Their collective work showcases the intellectual rigor fostered at Puget Sound.

ACHIEVEMENT AND GROWTH
This year has been one of significant institutional accomplishments and meaningful partnerships. Our collective student success efforts resulted in a 95% fall-to-spring retention of our first year students, and we are well positioned to retain 86% to their sophomore year. This is a testament to the supportive and enriching environment we’ve cultivated through our academic and cocurricular experience, whether graduate fellowships or hands-on learning opportunities; our athletic accomplishments, such as the or the ; and more.

Academically, we’ve developed a new program in Data Analytics, with the new interdisciplinary minor approved to begin in the fall. Starting next year, the experiential learning requirement will apply to all of our undergraduates, and this spring, four of our graduates were the first to complete the career development course series. We also have entered into an ongoing partnership with Seattle University and its School of Law with regard to the School of Law’s South Sound Hybrid Hub at Puget Sound here in Tacoma, which will bring legal programming and educational opportunities to Puget Sound students and aspiring lawyers in the region.

Our community partnerships  have also flourished this year. In December, we were proud to host the 38th annual Mary Bridge Children’s Hospital Festival of Trees, an event that raised more than $2.4 million to rebuild our community’s children’s hospital in Tacoma and gave us an opportunity to bring our campus community together as well. 

In December, we were especially proud when the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities honored FEPPS with its Beacon Award for Excellence in Student Achievement, a testament to our faculty and staff’s transformative work.

This spring saw many important accomplishments as well. A few key initiatives in particular have laid a stronger foundation for our university. March’s showcased our community’s generosity, raising over $300,000 from 1,375 donors in a single day.

Working together, we successfully concluded multiple projects of special significance to our campus that fully benefited from our institution’s highly collaborative practices:

• First, we partnered with the Center for Dialog and Resolution to conduct a series of listening circles with the entire campus community. The planning team will reconvene with governance heads and other interested parties over the summer to begin planning next steps, including integrating recommendations like increasing opportunities for cross-role connection and embedding listening circles as a standard practice. Thank you to all who participated in this process and your commitment to helping ensure Puget Sound models civil and respective dialogue across differences.
   
• Second, we hosted a successful site visit in April as part of our comprehensive accreditation evaluation of institutional effectiveness by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU). I am grateful for the leadership of the Accreditation Review Committee who spent the past two years thoroughly documenting our policies, financial procedures, and student assessment processes and am also thankful for the broad participation from the entire campus community during the visit. We expect to receive the final report this summer.
   
• Third, I want to express equal gratitude to those who contributed to the Total Compensation Benefits review over the past 19 months. I was pleased to bring forward the project team’s slate of recommendations to the Board of Trustees last week, all of which are designed to help ensure sustainable support for the faculty and staff who drive our mission.
   

ADVOCATING FOR HIGHER ED
Support for Puget Sound and other higher education institutions is vital, now more than ever. Our commitment to advocacy extends beyond our campus to ensure a supportive environment for all. This year, we have actively engaged in crucial efforts to champion the interests of Puget Sound. Our students and faculty joined a statewide advocacy day in Olympia, meeting with legislators to champion sustained higher education funding and programs like the Washington College Grant.

I joined my colleagues from the Independent Colleges of Washington in Washington, D.C., during the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) Advocacy Day. There, we met with Washington’s Congressional delegation to remind them of the importance of federal student aid, such as Pell Grants, the Supplemental Education Opportunity Grant, and Federal Work-Study.

I, along with educational leaders across the country, co-signed a that calls for constructive engagement with the federal government and speaks out against the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education.

This work is essential in safeguarding the future of Puget Sound and we will continue to partner with institutions of higher education across the country and our national organizations to defend our academic freedom and institutional autonomy to determine who may teach, what can be taught, how it is taught, and who is admitted to study.

LOOKING AHEAD
As we look ahead to the upcoming academic year, we do so with optimism and a clear sense of purpose, guided by our strategic plan, Leadership for a Changing World, the principles of A Sound Future, and our related divisional plans, such as our Strategic Enrollment Plan and Diversity Strategic Plan.

Enrollment: As of May 1, we have received deposits from 383 first-time-in-college (FTIC) students, falling short of our initial goal of 475 FTIC students. These numbers reflect a trend affecting colleges and universities nationwide, especially selective liberal arts institutions. Though these deposit numbers are currently lower than anticipated, the composition of the incoming class of 2029 is strong and will be our most diverse class yet. Students hail from 29 states and have an average unweighted cumulative high school GPA of 3.7. Almost 40% are student athletes.

New graduate enrollment is in a strong position and currently stands at 129 net deposits across all programs. This is eight students or 6% over the fall enrollment goal, and a 19% increase in new enrollments compared to the fall of 2024. Vice President for Enrollment Tim Whittum will continue to update the campus on our enrollment and anti-melt campaigns throughout the summer.

Budget: We understand that enrollment directly impacts our ability to provide the exceptional academic and collegiate experience our students deserve. While we expect that the incoming class will continue to increase over the next two months, the net enrollment shortfall will require us to modify our budget for next academic year. We will continue to work with the Board of Trustees over the summer on the necessary revisions.

Our leadership team is committed to ensuring that the budget shortfall will not hinder our educational mission or our ability to attract, hire, and retain capable and committed employees. We are committed to providing a 3% salary increase pool for faculty and staff as previously shared with the campus, and consistent with the Budget Task Force (BTF) and Total Compensation and Benefits (TCB) recommendations.

Total Compensation and Benefits Recommendations: As mentioned above, I presented the TCB project team’s slate of recommendations to the Board of Trustees last week. I am delighted to share that the board approved the recommendations and supports moving to the implementation phase. You will hear more about this later this week and continuing through the summer and fall.

Ongoing and new initiatives: While specific details will be shared in the fall, our key priorities will continue to focus on growing enrollment, enhancing our academic programs, fostering civil dialogue, supporting and inspiring our faculty and staff, generating sustainable revenue, and assuring that our campus is welcoming and provides a sense of belonging for all members of our community.

Vice President Whittum is already working on updating our Strategic Enrollment Plan to better attend to shifting demographics and decision-making patterns of college-age students and their families, and to adapt to changes in federal and state education policy, all in order to increase enrollment and maintain it at a stable and predictable level.

Enhancing our academic programs: We will launch several new academic initiatives and programs that will enrich the Puget Sound experience. In alignment with our Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Strategic Plan, we are proud to share a new collaboration with the Puyallup Tribe Heritage Division that developed a tailored curriculum for the upcoming Summer Academic Challenge, our enrichment program for Tacoma and greater Pierce County students in grades 7 to 12. The goal of the tailored curriculum is to foster deeper understanding and connection with our region's rich cultural heritage. As mentioned above, this fall will see the launch of a new data analytics minor, equipping our students with critical skills for a rapidly evolving world. We also continue to work towards offering low residency hybrid pathways in select graduate programs, with the MEd in Counseling leading the way in fall 2026.

Fostering civil dialogue: Your continued contributions to and support for our campus culture are essential to our ongoing success. To follow up on the work of this spring’s listening circles and continuing building skills to foster civil dialogue and growth within our community, we will work with , a nonprofit with extensive experience in dialogue facilitation training and conflict resolution. We anticipate that up to 24 faculty and staff members will participate in this training on May 19-20. These newly trained facilitators will then conduct a series of community dialogues during the 2025–2026 academic year.

Employee appreciation: In addition to moving forward with implementation of the TCB recommendations beginning this summer, we also plan to continue providing employee appreciation opportunities and activities, such as the upcoming Bonus Holiday on Friday, May 23. These activities are essential for expressing gratitude and recognizing the hard work and dedication of our staff and faculty to build a vibrant campus community.

Sustainable revenue generation: An increase of $700,000 in net revenues from Auxiliary operations from housing, dining, conference, and event net revenues is bolstering the general and educational budget. Events like the Festival of Trees and Special Olympics are contributing to this effort while also elevating the university's brand and bringing thousands of visitors to campus.

Campus enhancements: A special note of appreciation for our Facilities team who will be busy on campus this summer making improvements that benefit all of us, as shared in Facilities Services’ message earlier today.

I am filled with pride for all that we have accomplished together this year, and I hope you are, too. We are all in this together, and our collective good work and advocacy must continue so that we can continue to attract and retain our exceptional students. I wish you all a productive summer, in anticipation of continuing our partnership in the work that lies ahead.

With appreciation,

Isiaah Crawford, Ph.D. | President