A new interview in a series called "Why Twin Cities" asks President Rebecca Cunningham why she moved to Minnesota to lead the University. It came out Oct. 15, and the University reposted it to its Twin Cities news feed the next day. If you've followed Cunningham since she was a finalist, the answer won't surprise you. She didn't arrive here as a stranger.
Cunningham took office July 1, 2024, as the University's 18th president. She came from the University of Michigan, where she was vice president for research and innovation. In that job she grew the annual research portfolio to $2 billion and led strategy across 3 campuses. She is an emergency medicine physician. She earned her medical degree at Jefferson Medical College, did her residency at Michigan and was inducted into the National Academy of Medicine in 2019.
The Minnesota part comes from her own bio. She lives in St. Paul with her husband, Ken, and their dogs, Charlie and Olive, and she has 5 grown children. According to the president's office, the family's ties to Minnesota go back more than 30 years: YMCA family camp, canoe trips in the Boundary Waters and visits to local cultural institutions.
She said much the same when she visited campus as a finalist in February 2024. She described in-laws in St. Paul and yearly Boundary Waters trips, and noted she was married in Ely. She also gave a reason that had nothing to do with lakes. "I'm passionate about public higher education. It's what lifted me and my family out of economic hardship," Cunningham said at the time. She called the University "a gem" for the state.
She was up against 2 other finalists: Laura Bloomberg, then president of Cleveland State University, and James Holloway, provost at the University of New Mexico. The Regents picked Cunningham. More than 2 years in, she is now settled in St. Paul, and the Ely backstory is still part of how she explains taking the job.
