Elizabeth Rainey, EdD, has spent two decades working with college students at NYU, Columbia, Loyola New Orleans, and, for the past year, Fordham. She joined the University last September to enhance the student experience as Fordham’s first Vice Provost for Student Success.
“I love this age group,” said Rainey. “I love getting to know students on the precipice of figuring out who they are, what’s meaningful to them, and what problems they want to solve.”
One of the most prominent initiatives in her portfolio is the reimagined first-year experience. Her team will help first-years access resources and engage in community-building activities that will complement the new core curriculum launching in fall 2028.
She is also streamlining processes and working to build a shared identity across the teams she leads: the Career Center, the Office of the Registrar, ROTC, International Student Services, and Academic Support for Student-Athletes. And she works closely with units such as Student Affairs to ensure students feel supported.
Below she shares some of her team’s work, how she defines student success, and what her beloved pet reptile can teach us all.
What does student success mean to you?
I think about this question all the time. There are classic quantitative measures—the percentage of students returning each year and how many students graduate on time. I also think about success in a more qualitative sense, like what does it mean to be a thoughtful, Jesuit-educated, liberal arts-informed student who’s lived in New York City? I truly believe seeing more Jesuit-educated students in the world is one way I can give back broadly. The ability to navigate uncertainty and apply human-centered thinking to problems is also part of success.
What elements of the first-year experience are you working on in preparation for its official launch in 2028?
The vision for our first-year experience, called First Year Forward, is to integrate with the new core curriculum while offering transition support to all first-year students. By the end of the first year, we want students—regardless of program, school, or campus—to have access to similar levels of support, community-building activities, and experiences in New York City.
As we prepare for 2028, we’ve started with some programming to bring first-years together, including ice-skating in Central Park last February, professional headshots, AI training, and a home basketball game. This summer, Valerie Monaco, who directs the first-year experience, reviewed existing student orientation and onboarding programs and collaborated closely with Student Affairs and the advising offices. This fall, we’re engaging first-year students through co-hosted events with the Career Center, a Yankees game with the Office of Multicultural Affairs, and other programs. We’re trying to see what resonates with students.
What are some other initiatives your team is working on?
I was a trained success coach at Loyola and I would love to expand success coaching at Fordham. I define success coaching as strengths-based coaching, where students get to know a coach before they stumble, and receive help building motivation and setting clear goals. It’s happening in some subsets right now: Athletes and students registered with the Office of Disability Services have access to coaching. I would like to offer it to incoming students. I’m actively working on grants and funding opportunities that could make that possible.
We are also working on a new website for the Office of the Registrar (previously called Academic Records), and we’re looking at platforms that could improve the student and advisor experience for registration.
You’ve also launched a new tool to connect with students. How does it work?
It’s a texting service that allows you to check in with students. The messages come from Remy the pigeon, a persona we chose because it’s very New York, and pigeons have a history of carrying messages. (There’s also a campaign to “stop pigeon hate” so we played off that idea.)
Students received their first message, which essentially said, ‘Hey, I’m Remy. Ask me questions and I’ll respond or I will route you to somebody who can help.’ We got more than 500 replies to that first text. Students asked about resources like advising, where to pick up their mail, how to change their meal plan. And because we had spent the summer building a knowledge base, they got an instant reply if the question was something we could anticipate.
The platform is also set up so that certain responses get routed to an individual for appropriate follow-up. We did have one student respond with a heartfelt sense of homesickness, so that student got a visit the next day from a member of Residential Life. That’s why we invested in this, to shorten the time it takes to find a student who is struggling.
I hear you have a bearded dragon. What’s he like?
Sunny is a treat. I think a lot of folks can be very afraid of reptiles, but bearded dragons are very mellow. People who spend time with him, myself included, end up admiring his sense of calm. Like, maybe I need to be a little more like Sunny—just sit, tilt my head, and be still.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
