Ithaca College
Ithaca College is a private college in Ithaca, New York, United States. It was founded by William Egbert in 1892 as a conservatory of music. Ithaca College provides media-related programs and entertainment programs within the Roy H. Park School of Communications and the Ithaca College School of Music, Theatre, and Dance. The college has a liberal arts focus, and offers several pre-professional programs, along with several graduate programs, mainly in business, health sciences, and teaching degrees through the School of Humanities and Sciences.
History
Early history
Ithaca College was founded as the Ithaca Conservatory of Music in 1892 when a local violin teacher, William Grant Egbert, rented four rooms and arranged for the instruction of eight students. For nearly seven decades the institution flourished in the city of Ithaca, adding to its music curriculum the study of elocution, dance, physical education, speech correction, radio, business, and the liberal arts. In 1931 the conservatory was chartered as a private college under its current name, Ithaca College. The college was originally in the Boardman House; that building later became the Ithaca College Museum of Art, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.Modern era
By 1960, the college had some 2,000 students. A campus was built on South Hill in the 1960s, and students were shuttled between the old and new locations during the construction. The hillside campus continued to grow in the ensuing 30 years to accommodate more than 6,000 students.As the campus expanded, the college began to expand its curriculum. By the 1990s, some 2,000 courses in more than 100 programs of study were available in the college's five schools. The school attracts a multicultural student body with representatives from almost every state and from 78 other countries.
In October 2020, the college announced that 130 of its 547 faculty positions would be cut to reduce the school's budget by $30 million because of declining enrollment. 4,957 undergraduate students enrolled in the fall of 2020, versus 5,852 in 2019 and 6,101 in 2018.
In February 2025, the college announced the development of a new outdoor track facility at the college, due to be completed in spring 2026.
In August 2025, it was reported that the college agreed to settle a class action made by a group of former students regarding tuition refunds during the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of the settlement, the college agreed to pay the claimants a total of $1.5 million.
Organization
Leadership
The college is governed by a board of trustees, composed of 25 non-executive trustees. The board is currently chaired by John Neeson.Ithaca's current president is La Jerne Terry Cornish, who has held the position since March 2022 as the college's 10th president.
She replaced Shirley M. Collado, who served as the ninth president from July 2017 to August 2021. She was previously executive vice chancellor and chief operating officer at Rutgers University–Newark and vice president of student affairs and dean of the college at Middlebury College. She is the first Dominican American to be named president of a college in the United States. The college announced in July 2021 that Collado was stepping down in January 2022 to become chief executive of College Track, a college completion program based in Oakland, California.
Collado succeeded Thomas Rochon, who was named eighth president of Ithaca College on April 11, 2008. Rochon took over as president of the college after Peggy Williams, who announced on July 12, 2007, that she would retire from the presidency post effective May 31, 2009, following a one-year sabbatical. During the fall 2015 semester, multiple protests focusing on campus climate and Rochon's leadership were led by students and faculty. After multiple racially charged events including student house party themes and racially tinged comments at administration led-programs, students, faculty and staff all decided to hold votes of "no confidence" in Rochon. Students voted "no confidence" by a count of 72 per cent no confidence, 27 per cent confidence, and 1 per cent abstaining. The faculty voted 77.8 per cent no confidence to 22.2 per cent confidence. Rochon retired on July 1, 2017.
| President | Life | Tenure |
| - | - | |
| W. Grant Egbert | 1867–1928 | 1892–1924 |
| George C. Williams | 1874–1971 | 1924–1932 |
| Leonard B. Job | 1891–1981 | 1932–1957 |
| Howard I. Dillingham | 1904–1998 | 1957–1970 |
| Ellis L. Phillips Jr. | 1926–2006 | 1970–1975 |
| James J. Whalen | 1927–2001 | 1975–1997 |
| Peggy R. Williams | 1997–2008 | |
| Thomas Rochon | 2008–2017 | |
| Shirley M. Collado | 2017–2021 | |
| La Jerne Terry Cornish | 2021–present |
Campus
Ithaca College's campus was built in the 1960s on South Hill. The college's final academic department moved from downtown to the South Hill campus in 1968, making the move complete.Satellite campuses
Besides its Ithaca campus, Ithaca College has operated satellite campuses in other cities. The Ithaca College London Center has been in existence since 1972. Ithaca runs the Ithaca College Los Angeles Program at the James B. Pendleton Center. Former programs include the Ithaca College Antigua Program and the Ithaca College Walkabout Down Under Program in Australia.Ithaca College also operates direct enrollment exchange programs with several universities, including Griffith University, La Trobe University, Murdoch University, and University of Tasmania ; Chengdu Sport University and Beijing Sport University ; University of Hong Kong ; Masaryk University ; Akita International University and University of Tsukuba ; Hanyang University ; Nanyang Technological University ; University of Valencia ; and Jönköping University. Ithaca College is also affiliated with study abroad programs such as IES Abroad and offers dozens of exchange or study abroad options to students.
Academics
The college offers a curriculum with more than 100 degree programs in its five schools:- School of Business
- Roy H. Park School of Communications
- School of Health Sciences & Human Performance
- School of Humanities & Sciences
- School of Music, Theatre, and Dance
Student life
Media and publications
- The Ithacan is Ithaca College's official weekly newspaper that is written, edited and published by students. The Ithacan and its staff have won over 200 major collegiate journalism awards and is generally recognized as one of the top student-run newspapers in the country. Most notably, the newspaper is a consistent recipient of the Associated Collegiate Press' National Pacemaker Award; it has received the National Newspaper Pacemaker Award six times and the Online Pacemaker Award nine times. The Pacemaker has been widely considered the "Pulitzer Prize of collegiate journalism." The Ithacan is also a five-time recipient of the Gold Crown Award from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, most recently receiving the award in 2016. The Ithacan was also ranked #3 on the 2018 The Princeton Review Best College Newspaper list.
- Ithaca College Television is the world's oldest student-operated college television channel. Broadcasting since 1958, ICTV is available to 26,000 cable households. It is also one of the most awarded student-run television stations, with its news program, Newswatch, receiving best news telecast accolades from organizations including the New York State Associated Press Broadcasters Association, Society of Professional Journalists and Collegiate Broadcasters Inc. The show also received ICTV's first College Emmy Award from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. ICTV is housed and operated in the Roy H. Park School of Communications. Approximately 15 to 20 production teams operate simultaneously, utilizing around 400 volunteers each semester. Programming varies by semester, but typically includes news, sports, entertainment, scripted, and podcast programs.
- WICB is a student-operated, 4,100 watt FM station that serves Tompkins County and beyond, reaching from northern Pennsylvania to Lake Ontario, with a potential audience of over 250,000. The majority of programming on WICB – which broadcasts from 91.7 on the FM band – is modern rock, but the station also airs a number of specialty shows, which includes a number of genres that is not normally heard on public airwaves. Recently, readers of the Ithaca Times voted 92 WICB "Best Radio Station." WICB has also won the MTV U's Woodie Award for Best College Radio, while the Princeton Review ranks WICB the number one college radio station in the country.
- VIC Radio is Ithaca College's second student-run radio station. Previously available on 105.9 FM, VIC Radio is now an online-only radio station. It is most well known for its annual 50 Hour Marathon, in which four DJs broadcast for 50 hours straight to raise money for local community organizations.
- Buzzsaw Magazine, formerly Buzzsaw Haircut, was founded in 1999 and is an independent monthly alternative magazine written, produced and distributed by Ithaca College students. It is a progressive publication with a goal to "publish original creative journalism, commentary and satire that works to deconstruct society, pop culture, politics, college life and dominant Western beliefs." The faculty adviser is media critic Jeff Cohen, who is also the founder of the college's Park Center for Independent Media. In 2011, the organization added a new multimedia section to Buzzsaw, titled Seesaw, dedicated to creating documentaries, radio pieces, interactive graphics, and other multimedia pieces to complement the print and online magazine. Buzzsaw has also won a number of national awards, including the Campus Alternative Journalism Project's award for "Best Sense of Humor" and the Independent Press Association's Campus Independent Journalism Awards for "Best Campus Publication with a Budget Under $10,000" and "Best Political Commentary."
- Park Productions is a professional production unit within the Roy H. Park School of Communications which allows students to collaborate with faculty and industry professionals to create interdisciplinary media projects. Park Productions partners with community organizations, government agencies, and higher education institutions and has produced over 200 titles including documentaries, feature films, shorts, commercials, museum exhibits, television programs, educational, corporate, and web-based media. Awards and juried screenings include LA Webfest, Mexico International Film Festival, CINE Awards, Chicago International Film Festival, Official selections at Miami, University Film and Video Festival, Cinema in Industry Awards, Multiple International Communicator Awards, Oberhausen, Montreal, Palm Springs, and Hudson Valley Film Festivals.
- Distinct Magazine is self described as Ithaca College's "fashion magazine devoted to the style and culture of the students on campus to break gender and social class stereotypes in the fashion world, and to build a safe space for people to express themselves." The first issue was released online in 2016. The magazine is separated into five content sections: Fashion, Beauty, Life, Culture, and Health and Fitness. Distinct is released in print twice a semester.
- Embrace is an IC magazine which aims "to create a platform in which underrepresented students are able to see a representation of themselves on campus and within society." The magazine has separate content sections: LGBTQ+, Fashion, Politics and News, Mind Body Spirit, Personal Narratives, and Alumni Highlight. It was first published in February 2016.