Temple University hires former Drexel enrollment VP as it works to improve retention
Evelyn Thimba worked with Temple President John Fry when he led Drexel.
Temple University has tapped a former Drexel vice president to lead enrollment efforts as the school tries to improve retention and reverse student body declines.
Evelyn Thimba, a Kenya native and New York University graduate, worked for Temple President John Fry when he led Drexel. She oversaw enrollment and admissions for eight years, including four as senior vice president for enrollment management. Thimba departed in 2023 for American University, where she serves as vice president for undergraduate enrollment management.
“She worked so well not only on the enrollment side, but on the student success side, and we really need an integrated approach for how we’re going to recruit and retain students,” Fry said.
Thimba will have work to do at Temple, which like many other colleges has struggled to maintain enrollment in recent years. The university has experienced a 27% decline in its U.S. enrollment since 2017 to 29,503 last fall, amounting to an average of more than $200 million in lost revenue annually, according to an internal university report obtained last month by The Inquirer.
Retention from freshman to sophomore year also has been sliding, from 90% about a decade ago to 82% in 2024. (Enrollment at Temple’s Japan campus has grown exponentially to 3,400 this year and its Rome campus will begin to offer four-year degrees.)
But she also will have the advantage of arriving after the school recruited its two largest first-year classes in Temple’s history in fall 2024 and fall 2025.
“She’s coming to do a big job, but she’s also coming at a time when there is some nice early signs of momentum,” Fry said.
And the school is up 7% in deposits for the fall compared to the same time last year, said David Boardman, interim provost. Deposits from transfer students also are up.
Thimba said in an interview Tuesday she is excited to return to Philadelphia and work for Fry again. She starts at Temple on July 15.
“What really drew me to Temple though is this opportunity to help lead one of the country’s most important public urban universities,” said Thimba, who has worked in enrollment management for more than two decades including at New York University before Drexel. “I think Temple’s mission, its scale and reach are deeply compelling.”
She also was impressed with Temple’s recent strategic plan that prioritizes student success, she said.
In her new role, she will oversee admissions, student financial services, and the registrar’s office and work closely with undergraduate education and student affairs. Rob Reddy is currently serving in the interim role, following the departure of Jose Aviles, who took a job at Rutgers University.
» READ MORE: Temple’s former enrollment head gets job at Rutgers
Drexel recruited its three largest and most diverse undergraduate classes during Thimba’s tenure and student retention and graduation rates also improved, Fry said. That includes increases for students from lower income families who received federal Pell grants.
Thimba said Drexel created its “Student Lifecycle Management” effort while she was there, focused on the student experience from recruitment through graduation, bringing together all student services. Admissions, financial aid, the registrar’s office and advising were among the offices that collaborated, she said.
“Bringing all those together really helped elevate the student experience and move retention and student success metrics up,” she said.
In recent years, Drexel also has struggled with enrollment losses. Over about the last decade, the West Philadelphia university has lost about 20% of its enrollment. Last fall, the school saw a 19% drop in freshmen.
» READ MORE: Temple misses enrollment projection; main campus student population slides again
Thimba said she hopes to work with Temple’s team to create a similar “lifecycle” effort.
“I know Temple is already thinking about this and doing some good work,” she said. “I’m looking forward to digging in and understanding some of the opportunities we have, some of the initiatives we can put together to help not just attract students but also make sure that they are thriving and successful and ...get them through graduation.”
Thimba said she regards enrollment as “an institution-wide team sport” and student retention as everyone’s responsibility.
“I’ll be working very closely with the leaders to put together the strategies and initiatives, but I also expect the entire university to kind of rally behind its students as this becomes an institutional priority,” she said.
Thimba plans to look closely at Temple’s financial aid practices when she arrives, she said, to make sure the school is “optimizing it” to insure students graduate with as little debt as possible.
She said focusing on making college accessible to underrepresented populations has always been her focus, as well as helping them thrive once on campus. At Drexel, she helped start the Drexel Promise program, which offers a 50% tuition break to community college transfers who meet admission requirements and have an associate’s degree from a Pennsylvania or New Jersey community college.
“I’m looking forward to learning about the programs that Temple has,” she said. “I am so excited about the challenge and the opportunity that’s ahead of us.”
