Olin College president plans to step down amid financial strain at the school

The president of Olin College of Engineering will step down at the end of the academic year, a spokeswoman for the school confirmed Friday.

Gilda Barabino first announced plans to resign from her role at the Needham campus in a November school-wide email obtained by WBUR. Barabino, who will have served five years in that role, said she plans to join the faculty of the school.

Olin declined to make any further comment.

Barabino’s move comes amid financial headwinds for the small school, ranked as one of the top engineering schools in the country by U.S. News & World Report. The campus recently announced plans to reduce its merit-based scholarship, a core component of its low-tuition model, to preserve its future financial health.

Barabino is the college's second-ever president, who took the helm in June 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic when the school was still recovering from financial losses after the 2008 recession. She is the first Black person and first woman to lead the school.

The college’s search for its next leader began in December, according to a campus-wide email from the school’s board of trustees.

(Editor's Note: Olin College is an underwriter of WBUR. Our editorial decisions are independent of our business sponsorship.)

The tiny college, established in Massachusetts in 1997, welcomed its first freshman class — consisting of only 75 students —  in 2002. The selective engineering school, whose acceptance rate is less than 20% of applicants, has only three majors, and takes a unique approach to college education, emphasizing project-based and student-led learning.

Olin faces the same financial strains that plague many small colleges. But the school's original financial model — heavily reliant on its endowment — made it particularly vulnerable to economic downturns.

Funded with a $460 million grant from the F. W. Olin Foundation, the school originally provided a full-tuition scholarship to all students, hoping to “attract the brightest and most motivated" by reducing financial barriers to higher education.

Olin's endowment faced significant setbacks during the 2008 economic collapse, according to the college's filing to the Internal Revenue Service from June 2009. The school lost revenue and cut its full-tuition scholarship by half starting in 2010.

Olin announced last July that it will reduce its 50% merit scholarship — currently valued at $29,986 per year — further: all students entering in the fall of 2026 will receive $10,000 a year.

School leaders hope that reducing the merit scholarship will decrease financial pressures on the college, according to an email Barabino and the chair of the school's board of trustees, Jeannie Diefenderfer, sent to alumni in July 2024.

Olin's $421 million endowment, while "significant for an institution of our size," they wrote, cannot in the long term sustain the school's current endowment draw of 5.8% per year. They added that even with enrollment increases and operational changes, the school's net operating losses are around $4 million.

“We assure you we did not make this decision lightly or in haste, but, only after careful deliberation, motivated by our fiduciary responsibility to the College, our duty to uphold its mission, the legacy of our students and alumni, and the preservation of their hard-earned degrees,” their email said.

Will Manidis, a former Olin student who left the school to start his own company, said he was able to afford tuition, in large part, because of the merit scholarship.

"I think that story is true for many of the people that attended," Manidis said. "The fact that they are removing the scholarship and not acknowledging the impact that will have on Olin's already worsening diversity numbers is somewhat shocking to me."

Barabino is a biomedical engineer who earned a doctorate in chemical engineering from Rice University. She previously served as dean of the Grove School of Engineering at City College of New York. She has advocated for diversity, equity and inclusion in STEM education. In her November email to students announcing her resignation as president, she said she plans to “focus [her] efforts to effect social change through engineering and higher education more broadly.”

Kenneth Xiong, an Olin sophomore and president of its student government association, said students were surprised to hear of Barabino's upcoming resignation.

"The main emotion I felt was kind of sad," he said. "I really liked the energy she brings. She's really approachable, really believes in the vision of this school."

When he was running for office, he added, he campaigned on a promise that Barabino would shave his head in front of the school if he were elected. When he won, Xiong shot her a quick email asking if she would do it.

He said she simply replied, "What time and where?"