Mildred García, champion of college access, is named CSU chancellor amid system crisis

Mildred García, a longtime higher education leader who previously served as president of Cal State Dominguez Hills and Cal State Fullerton, was named chancellor of the California State University on Wednesday, trustees announced, stepping into the top position at a fraught time for the nation’s largest public four-year university system.

García, who is currently president of the American Assn. of State Colleges and Universities, will become the 11th Chancellor and first Latina to lead the 23-campus system. She is credited with improving Cal State Fullerton’s four-year graduation rate by 65% and won recognition from a host of state and national education groups for closing the achievement gaps between Latinos and their white and Asian peers. Earlier in her career, García served as president of Berkeley College, a for-profit college with multiple campuses in New York and New Jersey.

“The CSU has an extraordinarily skilled, dedicated and principled leader,” said CSU Board of Trustees chair Wenda Fong.

García returns to a university system beleaguered by widespread sexual misconduct among top administrators, and intense criticism over its handling of such cases. García’s predecessor, Joseph I. Castro, was forced to resign last year after he came under fire for his handling of sexual misconduct cases during his time as president at Fresno State University.

An investigation found Castro authorized a $260,000 payout and wrote a glowing recommendation letter for a campus vice president after an investigation found “credible evidence” the administrator engaged in sexual misconduct against an employee.

A slew of revelations across the system have followed: Times investigations found inconsistencies in the way campuses report sexual misconduct cases and demonstrated how campuses failed to properly investigate wrongdoing by top administrators.

García must also contend with many other serious challenges, including declining enrollment, stagnant wages for an increasingly disgruntled workforce and, more recently, a $1.5-billion budget gap that’s forced trustees to consider raising tuition, to the dismay of students.

García earned a doctorate and a master’s degree in higher education from Teachers College at Columbia University, and a master’s degree in business education and higher education from New York University.

She also holds a bachelor’s degree from Baruch College, which is part of the City University of New York system, and an associate’s degree from New York City Community College.

As president of the American Assn. of State Colleges and Universities, an organization that represents nearly 400 colleges and universities, García advocates for public higher education by working to influence federal policy.

Before leading the association, she was president of Cal State Fullerton for five years. The campus graduated more Latino students than any other campus in California during her time there, and the second most in the nation.

Garcia, who is of Puerto Rican descent, has said she can relate to many Cal State students because she shares their modest beginnings. Nearly half of the 460,000 students enrolled in the system are Latino, and many come from low-income families.

During an inauguration speech in 2008, at Cal State Dominguez Hills, which she led from 2007 to 2012, García recounted how she had to move into New York City public housing with her mother and six siblings after her father died. One of her friends died from AIDS and another from a drug overdose.

“But I held to values taught by my parents,” García said. “The only inheritance a poor family leaves its children is a good education.”