This Fall in Student Affairs: 3 New Realities Every Interim Leader Must Navigate
As interim leaders take the helm on campuses this fall, they step into a student affairs landscape shaped by compounding pressures: financial uncertainty, shrinking resources, and a rapidly evolving campus climate. These aren’t just policy or budgetary challenges, but they are deeply human ones, impacting student experience, staff well-being, and institutional culture.
Financial Aid Uncertainty and Student Stress
One of the most immediate and visible issues is the ongoing confusion and delays surrounding financial aid. Disruptions to FAFSA processing, shifting federal guidance, and inconsistent institutional communication have created a perfect storm of uncertainty for students and families.
“Students are showing up with no idea what they owe or if they can even afford to stay,” shared one interim vice president for student affairs. Another leader noted, “We’re seeing real emotional distress, and institutions are hesitant to acknowledge the depth of the problem — almost as if naming it would make it worse.”
For student affairs professionals, especially interim leaders arriving midstream, this silence is untenable. They are tasked with managing not just the operational consequences, but the emotional and relational toll these uncertainties take on students and staff alike.
Shrinking Resources, Rising Expectations
Stephanie Gordon, Vice President for Strategy & Impact at NASPA, offers a candid assessment of the current environment facing interim chief student affairs officers:
“It’s simple: Less. What an interim student affairs officer will face on campus is less. By that I mean, the interim will be met by less money, fewer programs, and fewer students. The world has changed in the past 2–3 years, and almost all campuses are grappling with a decline in resources and students.”
NASPA is the National Association for Student Personnel Administrators. It is the leading professional organization for student affairs officers and a key voice in shaping the direction of the field. Gordon’s insight serves as a strategic signal to interim leaders: the mandate this fall is not expansion, but adaptation.
This means reevaluating priorities, reallocating limited resources, and reimagining support systems meanwhile still meeting the high expectations of students, parents, and campus leadership.
Maureen Keefe, former Vice President for Student Development at Massachusetts College of Art, the nation’s only publicly funded college of art, notes that interim leaders must also be attuned to the shifting political landscape affecting higher education:
“A Registry Interim heading to a campus this fall, particularly at a public college or university, will be supervised by a president who is far more reluctant to speak or act as freely as 5 or 10 years ago. The current national administration, and some state administrations, have created and implemented scores of new rules and regulations that ultimately affect student life. Thus, an incoming Interim VPSA should be prepared to strategize and plan programs with a greater awareness of changed national and some state political climates.”
This growing tension between institutional autonomy and external regulation adds yet another layer of complexity to the interim role which is requiring political acumen in addition to managerial adaptability.
Culture, Belonging, and the Human Element
While national trends shape broad challenges, the work of student affairs leadership is always local. For Scott Brown, Vice President for Student Affairs at Wabash College in Indiana and a member of The Registry, the key is staying attuned to the lived realities of staff and students on campus.
“All my friends and colleagues are actively managing pressures on staff — loneliness, burnout, turnover, change — and societal and governmental issues such as protests, research funding, and political or free speech debates. I’m not saying that we are void of any issues at Wabash (avoids lightning bolt), but what is top of mind is to continue to press into the issues of belonging and community.”
At Wabash, a small all-male institution of about 900 students, belonging is fostered through close-knit peer networks. Brown explains:
“We’re constantly thinking about how to leverage a place where 60% of students are in a fraternity (and live in houses from the beginning), or part of a sport team — 160+ of the student body is on the football team. It’s a close-knit environment with one central rule for conduct: ‘The student is expected to conduct himself at all times, both on and off campus, as a gentleman and a responsible citizen.’”
Brown’s insight is a reminder to interim leaders: solutions must be tailored. Whether working at a large public university or a small liberal arts college, fostering connection, community, and clarity remains at the heart of effective student affairs leadership.
Michele Murray, Executive Vice President for Student Development and Mission at the College of the Holy Cross, highlights another emerging challenge for interim leaders: the fraying of student communication and dialogue.
“Interim Chief Student Officers going to campuses this fall and winter will meet students who increasingly do not know how to talk to each other. Almost every student lives on social media, and social media is governed by algorithms so that their ‘conversations’ are really one-way, all day. If there is a comment coming in return it will most likely be from someone who thinks like that person, dresses like that person, and agrees with that person. We need to spend time structuring group conversations on topics of pressing interest so that students can meet others who may not agree with them.”
As students navigate isolation in increasingly curated digital bubbles, interim leaders will need to foster face-to-face dialogue, build shared understanding, and help students stretch into uncomfortable, but necessary conversations.
Looking Ahead
This fall, interim leaders in student affairs won’t just be managing transitions but they’ll be navigating a landscape marked by less certainty, fewer resources, and greater complexity. But with insight, adaptability, and a deep commitment to student well-being, they can guide their campuses through challenge toward resilience.
This Fall in Student Affairs: 3 New Realities Every Interim Leader Must Navigate
As interim leaders take the helm on campuses this fall, they step into a student affairs landscape shaped by compounding pressures: financial uncertainty, shrinking resources, and a rapidly evolving campus climate. These aren’t just policy or budgetary challenges, but they are deeply human ones, impacting student experience, staff well-being, and institutional culture.
Financial Aid Uncertainty and Student Stress
One of the most immediate and visible issues is the ongoing confusion and delays surrounding financial aid. Disruptions to FAFSA processing, shifting federal guidance, and inconsistent institutional communication have created a perfect storm of uncertainty for students and families.
“Students are showing up with no idea what they owe or if they can even afford to stay,” shared one interim vice president for student affairs. Another leader noted, “We’re seeing real emotional distress, and institutions are hesitant to acknowledge the depth of the problem — almost as if naming it would make it worse.”
For student affairs professionals, especially interim leaders arriving midstream, this silence is untenable. They are tasked with managing not just the operational consequences, but the emotional and relational toll these uncertainties take on students and staff alike.
Shrinking Resources, Rising Expectations
Stephanie Gordon, Vice President for Strategy & Impact at NASPA, offers a candid assessment of the current environment facing interim chief student affairs officers:
“It’s simple: Less. What an interim student affairs officer will face on campus is less. By that I mean, the interim will be met by less money, fewer programs, and fewer students. The world has changed in the past 2–3 years, and almost all campuses are grappling with a decline in resources and students.”
NASPA is the National Association for Student Personnel Administrators. It is the leading professional organization for student affairs officers and a key voice in shaping the direction of the field. Gordon’s insight serves as a strategic signal to interim leaders: the mandate this fall is not expansion, but adaptation.
This means reevaluating priorities, reallocating limited resources, and reimagining support systems meanwhile still meeting the high expectations of students, parents, and campus leadership.
Maureen Keefe, former Vice President for Student Development at Massachusetts College of Art, the nation’s only publicly funded college of art, notes that interim leaders must also be attuned to the shifting political landscape affecting higher education:
“A Registry Interim heading to a campus this fall, particularly at a public college or university, will be supervised by a president who is far more reluctant to speak or act as freely as 5 or 10 years ago. The current national administration, and some state administrations, have created and implemented scores of new rules and regulations that ultimately affect student life. Thus, an incoming Interim VPSA should be prepared to strategize and plan programs with a greater awareness of changed national and some state political climates.”
This growing tension between institutional autonomy and external regulation adds yet another layer of complexity to the interim role which is requiring political acumen in addition to managerial adaptability.
Culture, Belonging, and the Human Element
While national trends shape broad challenges, the work of student affairs leadership is always local. For Scott Brown, Vice President for Student Affairs at Wabash College in Indiana and a member of The Registry, the key is staying attuned to the lived realities of staff and students on campus.
“All my friends and colleagues are actively managing pressures on staff — loneliness, burnout, turnover, change — and societal and governmental issues such as protests, research funding, and political or free speech debates. I’m not saying that we are void of any issues at Wabash (avoids lightning bolt), but what is top of mind is to continue to press into the issues of belonging and community.”
At Wabash, a small all-male institution of about 900 students, belonging is fostered through close-knit peer networks. Brown explains:
“We’re constantly thinking about how to leverage a place where 60% of students are in a fraternity (and live in houses from the beginning), or part of a sport team — 160+ of the student body is on the football team. It’s a close-knit environment with one central rule for conduct: ‘The student is expected to conduct himself at all times, both on and off campus, as a gentleman and a responsible citizen.’”
Brown’s insight is a reminder to interim leaders: solutions must be tailored. Whether working at a large public university or a small liberal arts college, fostering connection, community, and clarity remains at the heart of effective student affairs leadership.
Michele Murray, Executive Vice President for Student Development and Mission at the College of the Holy Cross, highlights another emerging challenge for interim leaders: the fraying of student communication and dialogue.
“Interim Chief Student Officers going to campuses this fall and winter will meet students who increasingly do not know how to talk to each other. Almost every student lives on social media, and social media is governed by algorithms so that their ‘conversations’ are really one-way, all day. If there is a comment coming in return it will most likely be from someone who thinks like that person, dresses like that person, and agrees with that person. We need to spend time structuring group conversations on topics of pressing interest so that students can meet others who may not agree with them.”
As students navigate isolation in increasingly curated digital bubbles, interim leaders will need to foster face-to-face dialogue, build shared understanding, and help students stretch into uncomfortable, but necessary conversations.
Looking Ahead
This fall, interim leaders in student affairs won’t just be managing transitions but they’ll be navigating a landscape marked by less certainty, fewer resources, and greater complexity. But with insight, adaptability, and a deep commitment to student well-being, they can guide their campuses through challenge toward resilience.
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