In so many ways Pat McGuire feels her career has been a series of “well-managed coincidences.” A lawyer by training, she never aspired to be a college president. But, this year, McGuire is celebrating her 30th year as president of Trinity Washington University in Northeast DC.
“I wanted to be a lawyer,” McGuire said in interview, “but along the way I became involved in public interest work, and through that work I became involved in education.”
Before arriving at Trinity, McGuire worked as the assistant dean for development and external affairs for Georgetown University Law Center, where she was also an adjunct professor. Prior to that, she served as project director for Georgetown‘s Street Law Program, which has law students teach an elective class in practical law at DC high schools.
Trinity was founded by Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur (or the SNDs), a Catholic order. (Originally known as Trinity College, it became Trinity Washington University in 2004.) A member of the congregation had always served as president of the school, McGuire explained. But, as the college faced difficult times in the 1980s, the order found it hard to find candidates who were qualified to serve as president.
With the agreement of the SNDs, the school’s board of trustees changed its bylaws and its very first lay president, James McGrath, took office in 1987. He was an experienced college president but found Trinity’s financial challenges daunting, McGuire said, and he chose to leave in the summer of 1989.
McGuire — who earned her law degree at Georgetown University and her bachelor’s degree cum laude at Trinity — was serving on the board at the time and volunteering with the university’s Alumnae Association. The board asked her to step in and fill the top post.
Early on in her role, McGuire felt unprepared for the complexities of managing people. She would often find herself going into meetings and laying out plans while people stared at her in silence. “I learned that people want to be part of the planning, not told what to do,” she said.
Once she learned how to be patient with the process, McGuire discovered what she considers key to being a successful leader: candor. McGuire has been outspoken in expressing her views on the Trump administration and Kellyanne Conway, a Trinity alumna. In a February 2017 blog post on the Trinity website, McGuire wrote: “Presidential Counselor Kellyanne Conway, Trinity Class of 1989, has played a large role in facilitating the manipulation of facts and encouraging the grave injustice being perpetrated by the Trump Administration’s war on immigrants among many other issues.”
Inside Higher Ed, a DC-based online publication that covers higher education, took note of her candor. “Many college presidents avoid talking or writing about anything remotely political,” editor Scott Jaschik wrote in response to the blog post. “But Patricia McGuire, president of Trinity Washington University since 1989, does not pull her punches.”
McGuire elaborated in her interview with The DC Line. “We need leaders who will be forces for good, unity and peace, but sadly right now we do not have that capacity in the White House or much of Congress,” she said. McGuire admitted she sometimes wishes that everyone could turn off their Twitter feeds and Facebook pages for a week and live each day without the hype and frenzy that they generate.
Trinity boasts that it leads all private universities in the number of DC Public Schools graduates in enrolls, and McGuire is passionate about getting more local residents through high school successfully and into college. “The local economy is truly a ‘knowledge economy,’ and people without advanced credentials are left on the margins of our local prosperity,” she said. “In DC proper, poverty is still a very real problem in the eastern half of the city, especially east of the river.”
Education, McGuire stressed, is very much a women’s issue. If DC were able to educate more mothers, they could educate more children, she said. Trinity’s first core mission value is to educate women.
Trinity has a long track record of educating women leaders. Its alumnae include Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi — McGuire’s Twitter followers know that she’s a big fan of the California Democrat — and an impressive list of leaders in academia, health care, nonprofits and corporations. (On Wednesday, Trinity’s twitter feed highlighted Corinne Cannon, founder and CEO of the Greater DC Diaper Bank, as a graduate.) The university offers part-time evening and weekend programs for both men and women, making the task of getting an education easier for those who have full-time jobs. McGuire added that Trinity is affordable — at $11,870 per semester for full-time undergraduate students, its tuition is the lowest among private universities in the region, with most if not all of the students receiving financial aid.
McGuire hopes that the DC government will create a true, need-based financial aid program that meets the needs of prospective students of differing ages and attendance patterns.
“Given the high poverty in parts of the city, the absence of a robust, local, need-based financial aid program is a real barrier,” she said.
Located at 125 Michigan Ave. NE, Trinity has drawn accolades for its success in educating economically disadvantaged students, with a student body that’s 95 percent African-American or Hispanic. According to Trinity’s website, Trinity has more than 2,000 students in five academic schools — liberal arts, professional studies, business, nursing and health professions, and education. Its undergraduates are almost all women; men account for about 5 percent of the enrollment in its coed graduate and professional schools.
Sixteen years ago, the school opened the Trinity Center for Women and Girls in Sports, a multimillion-dollar athletic complex that’s the largest facility of its kind in the country with a focus on females in sports. In 2016, the school opened a new academic center with new labs and classrooms — “its first new academic building in 50 years,” The Washington Post noted — and Trinity recently announced plans to emphasize global issues throughout its curriculum through a $250,000 grant from the Andrew Mellon Foundation.
Beyond the Trinity campus, McGuire has held a multitude of community leadership positions, including time on the boards of the Community Foundation of the National Capital Region, Goodwill of Greater Washington and Washington Hospital Center. She’s currently a member of the Women’s Advisory Board of the Girl Scouts of the Nation’s Capital and a board member of the Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area, the Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation and Catholic Charities DC.
McGuire’s best advice for women looking to follow in her footsteps is “aim high, work hard and don’t be afraid to promote yourself.”
“Too many women demur, standing back when they need to ‘lean in’ to have opportunities for advancement,” she continued. “If you don’t sell yourself, no one else will. Nobody can get ahead working only 9 to 5, Monday through Friday. You have to be willing to put in the extra hours, raise your hand, and volunteer for projects and take risks.”
Away from her job, McGuire loves being outdoors. A wildlife photographer in her spare time, she often takes weekend strolls along the Potomac River or occasionally on the National Mall. Her favorite DC spots include the National Gallery of Art and chef José Andrés’ Jaleo restaurant.
In honor of Women’s History Month, The DC Line is profiling notable women shaping DC. This is the first in a series of four articles we’ll be publishing this month.
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