{"id":154277,"date":"2026-01-29T02:27:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T02:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/154277\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T02:27:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T02:27:09","slug":"uh-downtown-president-to-leave-for-cal-state-long-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/154277\/","title":{"rendered":"UH-Downtown president to leave for Cal State Long Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"

After five years at the helm,\u00a0President Loren\u00a0J. Blanchard will leave the University of Houston-Downtown, where he led efforts to expand the campus’ physical footprint,<\/a> grow academic programs and boost student retention and graduation.<\/p>\n

Blanchard will assume\u00a0the presidency at California State University, Long Beach. His last day at UHD is\u00a0April 30.<\/p>\n

UHD: Houston-area universities earn national designation for community engagement<\/a><\/p>\n

“This announcement is bittersweet,” Blanchard said in a statement Wednesday. “From my first encounter with UHD, I was drawn to its commitment to higher education access and its potential as an agent of change. I am proud of the number of students graduating from UHD each year with degrees of value that have equipped them to lead both in their communities and in their fields. UHD’s impact on social and economic mobility is consequential for the city, state and region, changing the trajectory for graduates and their families for generations to come.”<\/p>\n

Blanchard is a 35-year veteran in higher education. His new role returns him to the Cal State system, where he spent six years as executive vice chancellor for academic and student affairs before joining UHD in 2021.<\/p>\n

His new position comes with more visibility and a larger student population: 42,000 students are enrolled at\u00a0Cal State’s university in Long Beach, compared to around 14,000 students at UHD.<\/p>\n

University of Houston System Chancellor Renu Khator praised Blanchard’s leadership at\u00a0UHD.<\/p>\n

“I am sad to see him go,”\u00a0Khator said in a news release announcing Blanchard’s departure. “I am confident that he will excel at\u00a0Cal State Long Beach and look forward to hearing about his continued success.”<\/p>\n

\"Loren<\/p>\n

Loren Blanchard, University of Houston-Downtown president, visits with members of the school’s Student Government Association on Friday, June 25, 2021, in Houston. (Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle \/ Staff photographer)<\/p>\n

As president, Blanchard focused on improving the student experience at one of Houston’s most diverse university populations – many of whom are nontraditional students who work and attend classes at the intersection of Buffalo Bayou and White Oak Bayou.<\/p>\n

One of his first projects was improving “wayfinding” on campus\u00a0–\u00a0helping students better navigate the main building and maze known as One Main, formerly the “Merchants and Manufacturers Building.” A new recreation center<\/a> opened during his\u00a0tenure\u00a0in 2023, and he also launched new academic programs, including a bachelor’s of arts in translation and new master’s programs in artificial intelligence, social work and educational leadership.<\/p>\n

Under Blanchard,\u00a0UHD doubled its fundraising portfolio and increased state and federal funding<\/a>, university officials said. He also laid out major expansion plans, both in academics and building capacity. His campus master plan aims to double UHD’s physical footprint by 2050<\/a>, using the reconstruction of I-10 to expand into the Warehouse District with a new student union and student housing.<\/p>\n

Regarding student success, his efforts had more mixed results. Enrollment was about 13,500 students in fall 2025, down from just over 15,000 in 2021.<\/p>\n

UHD’s freshman-to-sophomore retention rate also was stagnant over Blanchard’s tenure, at 67%. Six-year graduation rates rose slightly to 33% for the fall 2018 cohort, up from about 30% of the fall 2014 group. The numbers fell short of his\u00a0goal to nearly double graduation rates<\/a> from 2023 to 2026, closer to national\u00a0rates of 61%.<\/p>\n

UHD currently offers 45 bachelor’s degrees, 12 master’s degrees and 19 online programs within four colleges, according to UHD. It is the second largest four-year university in Houston and in the UH System, behind the flagship University of Houston.<\/p>\n

Blanchard has spoken extensively about being the first in his family to graduate from college. He holds a bachelor’s in speech pathology education from Xavier University of Louisiana, a master’s in education from McNeese State University and a Ph.D. in educational psychology from the University of Georgia.<\/p>\n

In addition to his time at the Cal State system, where he led a 10-year effort to boost student success measures, Blanchard previously held administrative roles at Xavier University of Louisiana, the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center and the University of Louisiana system. He is a former national president of the Kappa Phi Kappa honor society.<\/p>\n

This article originally published at UH-Downtown president to leave for Cal State Long Beach<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After five years at the helm,\u00a0President Loren\u00a0J. Blanchard will leave the University of Houston-Downtown, where he led efforts…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":154278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[10760,5529,131,133,132,75836,75834,75837,75835],"class_list":{"0":"post-154277","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-long-beach","8":"tag-cal-state-long-beach","9":"tag-california-state-university","10":"tag-long-beach","11":"tag-long-beach-headlines","12":"tag-long-beach-news","13":"tag-loren-blanchard","14":"tag-president-loren-j-blanchard","15":"tag-uhd","16":"tag-university-of-houston-downtown"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}