Interim President Richard McCormick
Richard L. McCormick, PhD, serves as the interim president of Stony Brook University,
an internationally recognized flagship research institution ranked as the No. 1 public
university in New York State. Appointed in August 2024, McCormick also oversees Long
Island’s premier academic healthcare system, Stony Brook Medicine, and serves as co-chair
of board of The New York Climate Exchange, a historic partnership anchored by Stony
Brook University to build an international climate solutions center on Governors Island.
With nearly four decades of leadership service in public higher education, including
presidencies at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey and the University of
Washington, and service as vice chancellor and provost of The University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, McCormick is an accomplished academic leader with a distinguished
record of success leading large, complex flagship institutions.
Championing Excellence, Innovation and Opportunity at Rutgers
During his decade long tenure at Rutgers-New Brunswick, McCormick focused on expanding the university’s reach and reputation, from enhancing experiential learning and interdisciplinary research to diversifying students, faculty, staff and programs, and strengthening partnerships with New Jersey government and business. While he was president, the university launched a successful $1 billion campaign and raised two-thirds of the goal before he stepped down as president.
Under McCormick’s leadership, Rutgers advanced institution wide diversity and equity efforts, including the creation of the Rutgers Future Scholars program, which expanded opportunities for teenagers from historically marginalized backgrounds and offered free tuition for participants who were admitted to Rutgers.
McCormick led the university’s innovative restructuring of undergraduate education in which four separate liberal arts colleges were united in a single School of Arts and Sciences that enabled all students to benefit from the full range of academic opportunities at Rutgers’ flagship campus in New Brunswick.
Under his presidency, the health science disciplines were brought back to Rutgers when the New Jersey Legislature passed a bill to integrate nearly all units of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey into Rutgers. At the conclusion of his presidency, McCormick was named president emeritus and returned to his roots on the faculty where he previously taught for 16 years. Most recently he was appointed as University Professor and the Board of Governors Professor of History and Education at Rutgers.
Advancing an Ambitious Vision at the University of Washington
As president of the University of Washington, McCormick made significant strides in
integrating the institution’s teaching, research and public service missions. His
seven-year tenure was characterized by a culture of collaboration and innovation,
a commitment to diversity, and an ambitious vision for the future. He prioritized
communication and outreach with external constituents to ensure a more outward orientation
toward surrounding communities and opportunities for the university to understand
and give back to the communities it served.
The university’s research and private giving funds set new records during McCormick’s tenure, totaling
more than $800 million for research and $239 million from private giving during the
final year of his presidency.
Academic Accomplishments, Honors and Awards
McCormick is an eminent scholar of American political history, with a BA in American
studies from Amherst College and a PhD in history from Yale University. In addition
to numerous articles and chapters, he has authored or co-authored four books, including Raised at Rutgers: A President’s Story; From Realignment to Reform: Political Change
in New York State, 1893–1910, and; The Party Period and Public Policy: American Politics From the Age of Jackson to the
Progressive Era.He is currently working on a new book on American political corruption from the 17th century to the present.
He is a recipient of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship, the Woodrow Wilson International
Center for Scholars fellowship and the Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Historical Studies
visiting fellowship at Princeton University. He has also received an honorary professorship
from Shanghai University and is an honorary doctor of laws at Rutgers.