Peter Rodriguez, Poets&Quants’ 2025 Dean of the Year, will leave Rice University after nearly a decade to become president of Wake Forest University. Rice Business photo

Peter Rodriguez, who spent nearly a decade rebuilding Rice University’s business school from a modestly sized regional program into a nationally recognized institution – and earned Poets&Quants‘ Dean of the Year honor in 2025 for the effort – is leaving Houston for a bigger stage.

Wake Forest University announced today (May 20) that Rodriguez will become its 15th president, effective July 1. He succeeds Susan Wente, who has led the university since 2021.

The appointment places Rodriguez among a select group of business school deans to move directly into a university presidency – Jonathan Levin of Stanford GSB, Santiago Iñiguez of IE in Spain, and Scott Beardsley of Virginia Darden are three high-profile examples; all of them, like Rodriguez, were also P&Q deans of the year before moving up to run entire universities – a crossover that has grown more common as trustees seek leaders who can manage complex institutions under financial pressure. Rodriguez is Rice’s first Hispanic dean.

WHAT HE BUILT

Rodriguez took the Jones Graduate School of Business job in 2016 with an ambitious agenda. By the time P&Q named him Dean of the Year last October, his success was hard to argue with: total student enrollment had grown 192%, driven by a doubling of MBA students, the launch of Rice’s first online graduate degree, and a hybrid MBA format. Tenure-track faculty expanded by more than 40%. The school’s alumni base grew 84% from 2015 levels.

The crown jewel may be the undergraduate program. Rodriguez pushed for a business major from his earliest days at Rice, and when it finally launched in fall 2021 it quickly became the most popular major among incoming freshmen. A naming gift in 2024 formalized it as the Virani Undergraduate School of Business. A $54.5 million, 112,000-square-foot building is under construction and set to open this fall.

“Rice Business has been an incredibly meaningful part of my life for 10 years,” Rodriguez says in an announcement from Rice about his departure. “The school is larger, stronger and more visible than it was a decade ago, a reflection not only of the business school community but of Rice University’s extraordinary culture of excellence and collaboration.”

THE MAN

Rodriguez is a Princeton-trained economist whose research spans corruption, globalization, economic development and social institutions. He grew up in Texas, earned his undergraduate degree in economics from Texas A&M, and completed his graduate work at Princeton — where he studied under future Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. A brief detour to JPMorgan Chase during his doctoral years only confirmed his vocation. “When I returned, I was really committed,” he said in a P&Q interview last fall.

Before Rice, he served as senior associate dean for MBA programs and chief diversity officer at UVA’s Darden School. He has provided economic commentary for Bloomberg Markets, CNBC and PBS, and currently chairs the board of directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’s Houston Branch.

WAKE FOREST’S PICK

The Wake Forest board was unanimous. “The Presidential Search Committee unanimously agreed that Peter Rodriguez was the best choice to lead Wake Forest into its third century,” says Jeanne Whitman Bobbitt, co-chair of the search committee and chair of the board of trustees. Fellow co-chair Curt Farmer cites Rodriguez’s blend of scholarly credibility and operational track record: “We were impressed by his academic credentials, business acumen, steady leadership, and reputation for strong relationships across his various campuses.”

Rice President Reginald DesRoches praises Rodriguez’s tenure as one that “created pathways for many more students to access a world-class business education” and says Wake Forest will benefit from his “vision, energy and inspiring commitment to excellence.”

Rodriguez’s final day at Rice is June 5. The school will launch an international dean search this summer. Provost Amy Dittmar has appointed Jeff Fleming – the Fayez Sarofim Vanguard Professor of Finance and a 30-year Rice faculty veteran who has served in multiple senior leadership roles including deputy dean – as interim dean.

“I am excited to carry those lessons with me to Wake Forest,” Rodriguez says, “a university I have long admired for its commitment to students, scholarship and meaningful engagement with the world.”

DON’T MISS POETS&QUANTS’ 2025 DEAN OF THE YEAR: PETER RODRIGUEZ OF RICE BUSINESS

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