Chancellor Mauli Agrawal discussed some of the larger achievements that have occurred over the past years in a press conference held on Thursday, April 9, as well as student concerns and future plans.
Carnegie R1 status, enrollment activity
“For the past three years, we have had the largest incoming class of freshmen every year. We keep breaking our own record.” Agrawal said even though collegiate enrollment nationally is down, “We are breaking the trend.”
Agrawal connected this with reaching Carnegie R1 status in February of last year.
“Only 6% of universities are given the designation,” Agrawal said. He also noted that the university’s research expenditures have tripled since his first year as Chancellor seven years ago.
“US News and World Report does rankings, and over the past two years, we have jumped 41 universities in the right direction,” Agrawal said, “We are doing kangaroo leaps.”
Despite increasing freshman enrollment, Chancellor Agrawal shared that his previous goal of reaching 20,000 students is unrealistic and adjustments need to be made as it now looks “beyond aspirational.”
Another trend standing out in enrollment numbers is the decline of international students.
“A lot of it is related to the geopolitical narrative that’s going on across this nation and across the world, as well as visa issues. We saw a very large decline last year of almost 35% in international graduate students, and we will see another one this year based on the number of applications.”
In lieu of the decline, Agrawal is still remaining firm on the importance of diversity on campus.
“We’re still trying very hard to keep recruiting people in different nations, because we do believe that bringing in international students enriches the campus diversity of different types of people and cultures.”
Athletics, World Cup
The Chancellor touched on athletics, notably with the signing of the new men’s basketball coach, Mark Turgeon. “As a result of that, we are gonna go back and play at Municipal Auditorium downtown,” according to the Chancellor.
Agrawal said women’s basketball will still primarily play at the Swinney Center under new head coach Candi Whitaker.
Excitement is through the roof with the FIFA World Cup just a few months away.
“This is a big deal,” said Agrawal. UMKC plans to use one of the dorms on campus to house auxiliary support staff for the tournament, and will also host a “fun family fest” on one of the tournament days.
“We’re working with the organizers to see if FIFA will let us do a watch party for each one of the games,” Agrawal said as our number 23 nationally-ranked soccer team will soon be rewarded with a new digital scoreboard, making Durwood Stadium a great spot to catch a game.
Capital projects
The Chancellor gave an update on the capital projects in the works for UMKC, the largest being the new dental school building on the health and sciences campus.
“It’s a $115 million-dollar building, it’s the largest capital project in our history, ribbon cutting will be in February,” Agrawal said.
The renovation to the Attebury Student Success Center is currently underway, and it features a “brand new student welcome center, which we have never really had.” He also noted that advising and all career services will be moving there.
The Conservatory renovations are also in progress, as they plan to break ground in the fall.
“The existing conditions there [at the Conservatory] are not the best right now. Bachelor students deserve better, so we’re still raising money for it.”
Chancellor Agrawal also commented on the abrupt vacate notice given to KCUR and other tenants of the 825 Troost building.
“It was under constant monitoring,” Agrawal said. The university-owned building, which was built on a landfill, was given an abrupt 90-day vacate notice by engineers.
“We started working on it quietly, and as soon as the holidays finished, we let people know we had to move out.”
Agrawal did mention that a space is available near campus, where they previously had plans to build a new building for KCUR.
“We were raising money for it,” Agrawal said. “I think we’ll have to reconsider those with the KCUR leadership.”
Fundraising
Agrawal said that fundraising at UMKC has stepped up like never before.
“We launched the largest comprehensive campaign in our history. It’s a little bit of a stretch goal, but we are hitting it, so why not?”
The campaign goal funds projects related to students and faculty, according to the Chancellor.
“700 million dollars,” Agrawal said, “We’ve raised 52% of it already.”
Agrawal said it’s the “people here” that have reached these milestones and continue to advance the University of Missouri-Kansas City.
![[FILE] Roof blown off downtown business after storms on April 23.](https://kcroonews.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Image-88-1200x900.jpg)
