Ronald J. Daniels is the President of Johns Hopkins University. Since taking office in 2009, Daniels has focused his leadership on three overarching themes – enhanced interdisciplinary collaboration, individual excellence, and community engagement. These themes are the backbone of the Ten by Twenty, the university’s strategic vision through 2020, and underscore the priorities of Rising to the Challenge, Johns Hopkins’ largest-ever fundraising campaign, a $5 billion effort.
Under Daniels’ leadership, the university has launched a series of transformative, multidisciplinary initiatives that seek to advance the understanding of some of society’s most vexing issues, from realizing the promise of individualized health to addressing the challenges facing urban environments. With the extraordinary support of Johns Hopkins alumnus Michael Bloomberg, the university began recruiting 50 new Bloomberg Distinguished Professors whose appointments in two or more divisions create bridges between diverse departments. Daniels is also championing a university wide vision for innovation, bolstering the efforts of faculty, staff, and students to translate their discoveries into novel technologies. As chair of the Executive Committee of Johns Hopkins Medicine, Daniels serves as a link between the university and Johns Hopkins Health System.
During his tenure, the university has invested heavily in student access, increasing the undergraduate financial aid budget by roughly 10 percent each year since 2010 and committing millions of dollars to graduate stipend supplements for doctoral candidates in Arts and Sciences. From launching the Gateway Science Initiative, designed to transform the traditional core undergraduate science curriculum, to establishing the first university-wide board to advocate for and support PhD programs, Daniels and his leadership team have worked to strengthen the student experience.