What Do People Misunderstand About Higher Education?

Lots of people, especially at Darden being a business school, come in thinking the university is run like a business or hierarchical organization. I always say that’s the wrong mental model.

For better or for worse, we are much more like the federal government. We have an executive branch where you have the president, provost, and all the deans and support staff of that branch.

We have this thing called the faculty senate, which functions much more like the House of Representatives or the Senate.

Faculty view themselves, as they should, as compatriots with the administration and executing the mission of the university, less so than just employees.

I can tell you as a dean right now, the dean doesn't tell the faculty what to do.

In terms of their research and teaching, they have a lot of freedom to pursue what interests them. Part of the joy of being a professor is having those opportunities.

In terms of our stakeholders, the list is immense. Being a public university, we obviously have Richmond and the governor's office, the General Assembly, and the citizens of Virginia who care very deeply about what we do.