August 17, 2016

After being commissioned to survey Drexel’s facility as an engineer, Hollis Godfrey accepts the offer to become Drexel’s second president in 1913. Godfrey reforms facilities, remakes curricula, regulates student admissions and eliminates “inefficient” faculty. He also consolidates the institute’s 13 more or less independent departments into four schools. His biggest legacy is the creation of the co-op program in 1919 and having all four schools offer bachelor’s degrees by 1916. Under Godfrey’s presidency, Drexel began to leave its vocational school origins behind. Godfrey resigns in 1921 to become chairman of the Council of Management Education and president of the Engineering-Economics Foundation, later dying in 1936.