About Lipscomb
L. Randolph Lowry III
President
Lipscomb University
Connecting the university to the Nashville community is a hallmark of Dr. L. Randolph Lowry’s presidency at Lipscomb University. He views the city of Nashville as the university’s campus and the world as its classroom.
Not long after his arrival on the Lipscomb campus in September 2005, Dr. Lowry proposed Lipscomb 2010, a $54 million plan to dramatically advance Lipscomb's academic programs and to invest in new campus facilities. As a result of Lipscomb 2010, a College of Pharmacy was established creating the first Lipscomb doctorate degree, 38 new undergraduate, graduate and doctoral programs were developed and six new institutes were established in conflict management; sustainable practice; law, justice and society; Christian spirituality; corporate governance and integrity; and civic leadership. This plan also included the renovation of several academic and residence buildings on campus, the building of a music wing and an apartment-style residence facility, among other initiatives. Under Dr. Lowry’s leadership, the university has experienced a 59 percent enrollment growth and has risen through the U.S. News & World Report rankings to an all-time high of 18th for the university.
Beyond academics, Dr. Lowry is involved in the Nashville community. He is a member of the Agenda for Nashville's Future, the Rotary Club of Nashville and co-chaired the Mayor’s Green Ribbon Committee and is a member of the Middle Tennessee Council of the Boy Scouts of America’s executive committee. He also serves on the boards of a variety of community organizations including United Way of Middle Tennessee, the American Heart Association, the Nashville Public Education Foundation, Character Counts and the YMCA of Middle Tennessee as well as on the leadership council for the Nelson and Sue Andrews Institute for Civic Leadership. He was a member of the 2007 class of Leadership Nashville. He is also one of the nation’s leading experts in conflict management and has been featured in a variety of national media outlets including on CNN, in Bloomberg Businessweek and Washington Monthly as an expert in the field. He is constantly engaged in the higher education community, teaching and participating as a featured speaker at institutions around the world.
Service is an important aspect of life at Lipscomb. Lowry believes that for service to be meaningful, however, the university community must also engage with the city. Lipscomb is the first university in Nashville with a service-learning requirement for all of its undergraduate students providing tens of thousands of hours of service to more than 75 community organizations.
He recently led the university through the completion of Lipscomb 2010, a five-year investment initiative that pumped an average of $1 million a month into the campus and academic programs for five years. The plan resulted in a renovated campus landscape, 38 new programs of study, 79 new full-time faculty hired and an increase in graduate enrollment from 221 in 2005 to 1,316 in fall semester 2011. Recently, Dr. Lowry announced Lipscomb 2016, an initiative to invest $125 million by the university’s 125th anniversary in 2016.