President Michael Rao, Ph.D.

Since Rao’s presidency began in 2009, VCU has emerged as a nationally recognized, premier, urban public research university and academic health system, becoming a leading research institution, expanding access and student success, transforming its academic and clinical environments and strengthening its impact across Virginia and beyond.

Under Rao’s leadership, VCU is ranked among the top 50 public universities in the United States for research expenditures and has more than doubled its research expenditures since 2020 to $524 million.

Over more than three decades as a college and university president, Rao has helped shape the national conversation about the role of public research universities in advancing opportunity, discovery, health and economic prosperity.

VCU educates approximately 30,000 students from 137 countries in more than 200 degree and certificate programs. As the largest employer in the Richmond area and among the largest in the commonwealth, VCU has an economic impact on Virginia of $18.5 billion; one out of every 61 jobs in the commonwealth is connected to VCU.

U.S. News & World Report ranks more than 20 of VCU’s graduate programs in the top 50 in the nation. Consistently recognized for excellence, VCUarts is tied for No. 2 among the best graduate fine arts programs in the country, per U.S. News & World Report. Likewise, five of VCU’s health sciences schools and departments rank in the top 15 for National Institutes of Health research funding in their fields among public institutions for FY2025.

VCU is one of only 80 public universities designated by the Carnegie Foundation as an “R1: Very High Research Spending and Doctorate Production” with “Community Engagement” status.

Guided by a bold vision for the modern public research university, VCU is currently developing a new strategic plan focused on driving student success, accelerating groundbreaking research and enriching the well-being of the communities it serves. Supporting these ambitious goals is Unlocking Potential: VCU’s Campaign for the Future, a historic $1.838 billion initiative aimed at fueling education, discovery and healing lives for generations to come.

VCU is classified as a Tier III institution with the highest level of financial authority by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia.

Rao has overseen one of the largest expansions of VCU’s footprint through the construction or renovation of approximately 16 million square feet of living-learning environments, academic meeting spaces and state-of-the-art clinical and laboratory facilities. With guidance from the master facility plan, the university’s mission and physical environments will better align to support student success and patient experience while also focusing on safety, mobility and collaboration across programs.

Recent projects include the VCU Engineering Research Building, the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU Children’s Pavilion, VCU Health’s Adult Outpatient Pavilion and the state-of-the-art STEM building with expanded lab space and support for innovative teaching methods.

Rao serves as chair of the Virginia Bio+Tech Partnership Authority and is a member of the Coalition of Urban Serving Universities, for whom he serves as its representative for the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities. He also is a senior executive advisory committee member with the Northern Virginia Technology Council. Rao served as past chair of the American Council on Education as well as the Virginia Council of Presidents and is a past board member of the NCAA.

Rao’s career in higher education began in California in 1992, when he became president of Mission College. At the time, he was the youngest college president in the nation. He went on to serve as chancellor of Montana State University – Northern and president of Central Michigan University.

A tenured professor in the VCU College of Health Professions, Rao holds a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of South Florida and a Ph.D. in higher education and business administration with an organizational behavior minor from the University of Florida. He was named a USF Distinguished Alum in 2022. He and his wife, Monica — a watercolorist and graphic designer — have two adult sons.