Montana State University President Waded Cruzado. (Provided by MSU)
Montana State University President Waded Cruzado will retire June 2025 after 15 years at the helm of the Bozeman campus in a tenure MSU described as “transformative.”
MSU said Cruzado, the university’s 12th president, set records “in nearly every major university metric,” including enrollment, research, fundraising, and student persistence and graduate rates.
For example, MSU saw $850 million in philanthropic giving during her tenure, MSU said.
In a retirement letter MSU posted on its website, Cruzado said none of the adults in her home in Puerto Rico, where she grew up, had the opportunity to go to college, but she said her family valued education, and her grandmother gave her a treasure that changed her life, “reading lessons at the kitchen table.”
Cruzado said she owes her family a debt of gratitude, and she also thanked the university community of students, faculty, alumni and fans.
“You trusted me, you laughed with me, argued with me, questioned me, you helped me, you worked endless hours at my behest, you made impossible things happen, but most of all: You joined me in believing that what we do here is vitally important to our country and to the world. You joined me in giving a portion of our life to the conviction that public higher education matters,” Cruzado said in her letter.
Cruzado started at MSU in January 2010, overseeing the main campus in Bozeman and affiliates in Billings, Havre and Great Falls. In her letter, she said she will retire effective June 30, 2025, and in the meantime, she encouraged supporters to join her and “cheer on the Bobcats at the top of our lungs.”
Monday afternoon, the head of the MSU Faculty Senate could not be reached for comment via voicemail or email, and the president of the Associated Students of MSU could not be reached via a message left with a phone receptionist. An email to the MSU Staff Senate bounced back, and a phone number was not available.
In a statement from MSU, however, Commissioner Clayton Christian said Cruzado transformed higher education.
“She is an exceptional leader and advocate who cares with her whole heart about the students, faculty, staff, fans and alumni who make up a university community,” Christian said. “Exceptional leaders leave an organization better than they found it, and President Cruzado has done that to a historic degree.
“Thanks to her, Montana State University sits strong and well prepared to embark on its next chapter.”
MSU said Christian will conduct a search for Cruzado’s successor on behalf of the Montana Board of Regents with help from an executive recruitment firm.
Cruzado departs with nearly a decade more of experience than the current 5.9 years’ tenure of the average college president in the U.S., according to a 2022 recent survey by the American Council on Education. She also appears to be leaving as the highest paid public official in Montana, with $576,300 in salary and other compensation.
Cruzado leaves in the midst of a federal probe into allegations of discrimination following numerous complaints from students and others.
In October 2023, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights announced it had opened up an investigation into allegations of discrimination against LGBTQ+ students after it received 20 complaints, and it subsequently opened up five other civil rights investigations.
Cruzado has declined numerous requests for interviews on the subject; an MSU spokesperson did not respond to a similar request Monday but said the investigations are still pending.
Through a spokesperson in the Commissioner’s Office, Christian said Monday he “absolutely did not” encourage Cruzado’s retirement.
In its announcement about her retirement, MSU outlined her achievements, including driving up success and raising money and research spending at the university. MSU noted the following:
- Student enrollment rose by 33% since 2010, making MSU the state’s largest university with nearly 17,000 students, MSU said. MSU also broke “modern records” in retention, or keeping students enrolled for a second year, at 77.9% last fall, and in 2023 it saw its second-highest graduation, 3,503.
- MSU saw a 133% increase in annual research expenditures from $98.5 million in 2009 to a record $230 million in 2023, “making Montana State the university with more research expenditures than all public and private universities in the state combined.”
- Philanthropic giving hit $850 million total on her watch, MSU said. That includes a $101 million gift from Mark and Robyn Jones for nursing education buildings. It also includes two controversial gifts from the Gianforte Family Foundation, one for $8 million for the Gianforte School of Computing and one for $50 million for Gianforte Hall , naming gifts approved by the Montana Board of Regents. The naming gifts for the Gianforte family drew many protests. Some people, including students, said they did not want to emblazon the name of Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte on the campus because he has signed bills that harm people who are transgender and given money to groups that oppose gay rights.
- Cruzado helped open an American Indian Hall on campus in 2021, a $20 million project Cruzado’s predecessor started that she completed, MSU said. It also said MSU hit record enrollment of American Indian and Alaska Native students in 2023 at 817.
- Cruzado championed the Freshman 15 initiative, an effort to encourage students to take at least 15 credits each semester in order to save on tuition and graduate on time, MSU said: “In the fall of 2023, 81% of new, first-time MSU students were participating in the Freshman 15, a dramatic increase from the 50% when the program started in 2011.”
- She also created the MSU Hilleman Scholars Program, which provides financial and academic assistance, mentoring and leadership training to students who show potential but might not otherwise consider college. The program is named for Maurice Hilleman, who attended MSU on a scholarship, then developed eight of the 14 vaccines commonly given to children, and inspired Cruzado to launch the program, MSU said.
A wetlands biology student who led the effort to bring federal scrutiny to MSU praised Cruzado for being a trailblazer as a hispanic woman and administrator in higher education, starting programs such as the Hilleman Scholars, expanding some academic programs, and bringing significant money to MSU.
However, Alexandra Lin also said she hopes a new president will turn over a new leaf at the university when it comes to priorities.
“(Cruzado) has done a lot of good, but she’s also caused a lot of harm to a lot of professors, other administrators, to a lot of students,” said Lin, who filed complaint that’s under investigation by the Office for Civil Rights. “And I hope both those stories get told in the upcoming weeks, and that her tenure is not a mark for how we go forward as a university for prioritizing profits over the well-being of students and the quality of education.”
Lin helped draw federal attention to MSU by encouraging students to share their discrimination experiences with the Office for Civil Rights directly rather than report them to a campus office; some students believed MSU preferred to sweep their complaints under the rug.
“Her legacy will be marked by a lot of seemingly conflicting things,” Lin said.
In its announcement, MSU noted other academic, athletic and professional achievements that took place under Cruzado’s watch:
- “(Students’) accolades include 41 Goldwater Scholarships, 23 Fulbright grants, 13 Udall Scholarships, seven Boren Scholarships, nine Truman Scholarships and three Rhodes Scholarships, among many other awards of scholarly and service distinction.”
- Men’s and women’s basketball have won conference championships, and women’s rodeo earned its third national team title, MSU said. “On the gridiron, MSU has won the Big Sky Conference four times during Cruzado’s presidency, including a historic run to the FCS national title game in 2021 … Perhaps most importantly to the hometown faithful, the Bobcats defeated their cross-state rivals (the University of Montana Grizzlies) in seven out of the 13 Cat-Griz games played so far during her tenure.”
- Cruzado was appointed by President Barack Obama to the Board for International Food and Agricultural Development in 2012 and 2017. She also led the boards of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and HERS, Women in Higher Education Leadership.
In her letter, Cruzado invited the community to join her at the “scholarly, artistic, cultural, athletic and community-building events that we plan with so much love.” In a recent high-profile event, the MSU field house was the site of a rally by former President and GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, although the Trump campaign rented the facility, and MSU did not host the event.
“The promise of public higher education to better ourselves, our communities and our country endures as brightly today as it did in 1862 when President Abraham Lincoln signed the Morrill Act into law, establishing — for the first time — a public university in each state and territory of a still very young nation,” Cruzado said. “Montana State has remained true to this foundation, opening its doors to all.”
She said the new year brings new opportunities as well.
“I know this magnificent university, this place where anyone with the desire to make their life better can do so, is in good hands,” Cruzado said. “For it is your university: It is in your hands, as it has always been and shall ever be.”
Local News
