David Callejo Pérez, Chancellor, Penn State Harrisburg

David Callejo Pérez, chancellor of Penn State Harrisburg, spoke with Invest: about the institution’s growing role in the Harrisburg region and within the greater Penn State system. “Opportunity, innovation, social change, and the needs of the community remain our core priorities. We want to make Penn State Harrisburg the center of change and education in Central Pennsylvania.”

What changes over the past year impacted Penn State Harrisburg, and in what ways?

The last year has been focused on four or five main changes in higher education. The first deals with changes to financial aid and how it affects students that rely on aid. The second is around research, which covers everything from our applied work connected to the community to areas like medical research. The third is around enrollment.  We are fortunate that about 15%-18% of our students are international. And with the uncertainties around international student recruitment, we have to continuously adapt.  Harrisburg is unique, even within the Penn State Commonwealth system, in that about 52% of our incoming students are from out of state or international. At the same time, data from the census shows that almost 80% of our graduates over the last 20 years have stayed in the state one year after graduation. Five years later, that number is 75%, and 10 years later it is 70%. Pennsylvania overall is a net exporter of talent and college graduate population. Along with that change, we have seen an increase in our Latino population. The fourth change we are focused on is our budget, looking at it from the state, local, federal, and industry levels. It has also been impacted by everything from AI to access to jobs that pay well without having to go through college. 

During all of this change, we are running a full operation. Every time there’s an issue, it impacts both our students and our staff. We are excited and hopeful as we move forward. With technology and AI in constant change, my answer in a few months will probably be different than it is today. 

You are a part of the bigger Penn State ecosystem. How do you see your distinctive role evolving as students and families weigh cost, value, and the overall campus experience?

Our campus began 60 years ago as a school of opportunity for upper-division and graduate students. We are built on an old Air Force base, and Penn State set up an education center to allow individuals to complete their degree and get an advanced master’s degree. Between 2004 and 2006, the chancellor changed the school to include first-year programs. 

We are a place of opportunity and change, built within the community. The success of the Greater Harrisburg region is our success, and vice versa. As we began to grow, we began bringing talent into the state. We are the anchor institution of the Harrisburg region. Where our graduates end up should reflect our community. 

We have programs ranging from AI and engineering to teacher education and the arts, and our goal is to provide a comprehensive space to study. Historically, we have been focused on engineering, technology, and business. In the last eight to 10 years, we have become more engaged in the allied health space, including applied behavioral analytics, autism research, nursing, clinical psychology, and kinesiology. We partner with the Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Health to be at the core of the technology medical space in Central PA. We have corridors to Washington, D.C., and the entire Northeast. We are currently building a medical prototyping lab to focus on life sciences, marrying engineering and medicine while bringing in our social science and business background. 

As an anchor institution, we are taking the lead on the economic development and future of the Harrisburg region. Our campus sits in close proximity to Three Mile Island, which is reopening through Constellation Energy to power nearby data centers. We host regular meetings here on campus and are involved in the environmental and economic development aspects of the project. Our future is focused on being a place of opportunity and change that can create a greater good. We provide that access to students as the world changes. “Opportunity, innovation, social change, and the needs of the community remain our core priorities. We want to make Penn State Harrisburg the center of change and education in Central Pennsylvania.”

Regional universities nationwide are navigating enrollment shifts and funding pressures. How are those dynamics unfolding at Penn State Harrisburg?

The makeup of our programs, especially at the graduate level, is in high-demand areas, but enrollment continues to be challenging. Fewer and fewer people nationwide are entering graduate programs. Graduate enrollment is a big piece of our identity, and we need to adjust. We want to service more international students, but changes in policy can affect international enrollment. The part-time learners have also been a big space, and we need to think about continuing education with stackable credentials. While the closure of several Penn State Commonwealth campuses has not affected our campus, we are working to assist faculty, staff and students from two of the campuses close to us. We recruited a number of students from those areas when they closed. Our undergraduate enrollment increased this year compared to last year. 

We are committed to ensuring that the region around us sees Penn State Harrisburg as an option for higher education, which is why we have invested in advertising what we offer here. We have full student services, including affinity-based counseling that can address the diverse needs of our student body. Post-pandemic, we grew very fast with returning students seeking to complete their degrees. We’ve had our highest graduation classes in the last two years. For three years now, it has led to us having about 100 fewer residential students (even as our incoming class has increased), but at the same time our online student enrollment has grown. Parents are becoming very savvy, and students are focused on return on investment. We have leaned into our integrated undergrad/grad program that shows students they can leave with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in just five years. We are very good at shifting on a dime. In 2019, we were only at about 20% healthcare program enrollment, and we are currently at 50%.  

What key goals and priorities do you have for Penn State Harrisburg for the next two to three years? 

We will continue being a traditional, comprehensive four-year institution while leveraging the greater Penn State research piece. In the last five years, we have gone from $2 million per year in research expenditures to $11.1 million   this year, putting us in a different category. We are hiring five or six faculty with a focus on AI in art, communication, engineering, and business. We are now a partner in this space and look forward to expanding in the broader research space. This will help attract students and talent. We want to continue to be the higher education choice in the Greater Harrisburg region. We will continue sharing our story and expanding recruiting efforts in Pennsylvania and neighboring states. Our diverse campus and central location allows students to leverage regional transportation. We provide a holistic education for students to find themselves. Students can utilize a multidisciplinary approach, where engineering students can take art classes. We will continue to address and provide for the community’s needs. We let our faculty and staff dictate what we are engaged with. People need to see themselves where they go. We also emphasize veteran students, from 19-year-old students in the National Guard to 40-year-old students coming to school for the first time.  

We live the mission of engaging students in and out of the classroom. We provide opportunities to steer students to careers and empower them within those careers.