After starting her post-secondary education career as a faculty member teaching English, Kress now presides over Virginia’s largest community college — and one of the nation’s largest — with more than 70,000 students across six campuses, including NOVA’s Medical Education Campus in Springfield. This year, NOVA opened its new data center operations training center in Woodbridge, supported by a $5 million federal grant, and broke ground on the college’s first skilled trades center in Manassas.

In October 2024, however, Kress received an overwhelming “no confidence” vote from college faculty who claim she has harmed students by removing athletic programs, ignoring staff input and reducing summer class offerings. In a statement, Kress said she’s “committed to fully informed, open and honest communications.”

Her tenure at NVCC began in 2020 following a nearly 30-year career including posts as provost at Santa Fe University and president of Monroe Community College in Florida.

WHAT PEOPLE WOULD BE SURPRISED TO LEARN ABOUT ME: My husband and I are avid concertgoers. We’ve seen artists ranging from Devo to Max Richter to the Wu-Tang Clan to Alison Krauss and Union Station, and have tickets for Beyoncé, Big Thief and Haim.

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Focused primarily on online learning for working adults, Strategic Education was formed in 2018 through the $2 billion merger of Strayer Education and Capella Education. Year-over-year revenue for Strategic Education increased nearly 5% in the first quarter of this year.

McDonnell previously served as president and CEO of Strayer, which he joined in 2006. He was chief operating officer and later was a board member before taking the corner office in 2013.

Strategic Education’s programs range from Capella and Strayer universities in the U.S., which offer primarily online associate, bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral programs, to three programs in Australia and New Zealand.

Its Education Technology Services division has an education benefits administration program for employers and offers Sophia Learning, with online general education-level courses for college credits.

McDonnell previously was COO of Intelistaf Healthcare, and before that, worked as a vice president at Goldman Sachs. From 1995 to 2000, he was general manager of Walt Disney World.

McDonnell has a bachelor’s degree in political science from Virginia Wesleyan University and an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.

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An economist with a doctorate from Princeton, Hallock joined University of Richmond in 2021. One of the private school’s long-term goals has been affordability. Need-based aid packages average $64,880 toward roughly $84,000 in annual costs for tuition and room and board. Starting this fall, families earning $75,000 or less qualify for a full ride.

This fall, UR plans to launch The Center for Liberal Arts and AI, “bringing together researchers, students, and educators from colleges across the Associated Colleges of the South to explore pressing social, cultural, and legal questions and dimensions of artificial intelligence.”

In 2023, UR’s Robins School of Business received an anonymous $10 million gift to establish an endowed scholarship fund, and alumni Carole and Marcus Weinstein donated $25 million to support a student learning center based at UR’s library.

With a student body of about 3,700 students, 10% of UR’s enrollment is made up of international students representing almost 80 countries.

Hallock spent 16 years at Cornell University, including as dean of its business college. He co-founded PayStandards, a software company that assists companies in setting equitable salaries.

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