Introducing Our New VP of Strategic Enrollment Management

I am pleased to announce that Eric Groves, who has served and advised colleges and universities in the United States and around the world for 25 years, will join the University of San Francisco in mid-April as vice president of strategic enrollment management.

Eric will report to Provost Eileen Fung and serve as a member of the president’s cabinet. When USF names its next president, Eric will report directly to the president, and will lead the team of professionals in the Division of Strategic Enrollment Management (SEM). Eric was selected for this key leadership role after a national search with help from NES, an executive search firm specializing in enrollment management and related searches.

I am especially grateful to Julie Orio, vice president of operations and search committee chair, and the committee members: Angie Davis, assistant vice president, Office of Marketing Communications; Otgo Erhemjamts, dean of the School of Management; Sherie Gilmore-Cleveland, associate vice provost, undergraduate admission; Rebecca Hong, vice provost for student success, inclusive excellence, and curricular innovation; Ingrid McVanner, assistant vice provost, enrollment data management; Dean Rader, professor, Department of English and the Honors College; Stephanie Shrieve-Hawkins, deputy athletics director, and the many members of our USF community who participated in the search process.

Eric currently serves at Liaison, the nation’s largest higher education-focused technology company, where he leads the sales and consulting team in the Western United States and internationally. Prior to joining Liaison, Eric spent 10 years at RNL as the leading consultant in the Western United States and as senior vice president in charge of presidential relationships. His work as a consultant has helped hundreds of universities improve their enrollment outcomes.

Prior to working in consulting, he spent 15 years at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. There, among other accomplishments, he led the admissions team to grow incoming student enrollment, increased academic benchmarks each year, and doubled the percentage of racially and ethnically diverse students in the incoming class. In January 2022, he took a sabbatical from RNL and served as the interim vice president for enrollment management at Washington & Jefferson College in Pennsylvania, a 242-year-old liberal arts institution. There, he worked with other campus leaders to achieve a 12 percent increase in new students after several years of declining enrollment.

Eric is frequently called upon to speak at presidential and higher education conferences about enrollment marketing, the state of higher education, emerging trends in students’ college search process, financial aid optimization, higher education revenue generation, and strategic enrollment planning. He holds a PhD in higher education from Azusa Pacific University, where his research focused on student success, particularly at two-year institutions.

Eric and his wife, Michelle, have two daughters (one in college and one a recent graduate).

I also want to send sincere thanks to Jennifer Delahunty, who has served as interim vice provost of strategic enrollment management since August 2024. She has made meaningful contributions to SEM operations, and I know you will join me in expressing gratitude for sharing her knowledge, experience, and counsel with us. Jennifer will overlap for a few weeks with Eric before she departs the Hilltop in mid-May.

And thanks to all of you for your partnership, creativity, and energy as we have worked together to engage with prospective first-year, transfer, international, and graduate students as they consider joining the USF community. As Eric told us when he accepted our offer to work with us, “It’s a great time to be a Don!”

Sincerely,

John P. Fitzgibbons, S.J.

Interim President
Chancellor and Chief Mission Officer