Acute Crisis Leadership in Higher Education: Lessons from the Pandemic

This book explores higher education leadership during times of extreme pressures and limited, changing information.

Organized around different functional units in higher education institutions, chapters describe the ways in which campus communities were affected by and responded to the early pandemic crisis. By unpacking observations of real leaders from American institutions of higher education during the COVID-19 pandemic, this book provides lessons learned and takeaway strategies for complex decision-making during a crisis. This edited collection explores the unique moment when leaders and teams must make, implement, and adjust plans rapidly to assure delivery of their missions, while still addressing the needs of students, parents, employees, and stakeholders.

Shining a bright light on decision-making in the early acute stage of a crisis, this book prepares higher education educators to be effective leaders and successful decision-makers.

Gabriela Cornejo Weaver is Assistant Dean of Student Success Analytics and Professor of Chemistry, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA.

Kara M. Rabbitt is Associate Provost of Academic Initiatives at William Paterson University, USA.

Suzanne Wilson Summers is Assistant Vice President for Teaching and Learning at Ivy Tech Community College System, USA.

Rhonda Phillips is Dean, Purdue University John Martinson Honors College and Professor of Agricultural Economics at Purdue University, USA.

Kristi N. Hottenstein is Owner of Compass Counseling & Coaching, PLLC and has served as Vice Chancellor for Enrollment Management at the University of Michigan-Flint, as Vice President of Student Services at Jackson College, and as Dean of Students at Adrian College, USA.

Juanita M. Cole is Dean of the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences at California State University Monterey Bay (CSUMB), USA.