UCF President Alexander Cartwright Gets Three-Year Contract Extension Through 2029

University of Central Florida President Alexander Cartwright will lead Florida's largest university for three more years after the state university system's Board of Governors unanimously approved an extension of his contract this week. The extension, already approved by UCF's Board of Trustees, keeps Cartwright in the job through December 2029.

The vote was accompanied by praise from board members, who credited Cartwright with steering UCF through a period of rapid change that included the school reaching the benchmarks for preeminent university status and landing the largest gift in its history.

What the board approved

The extension does not change Cartwright's pay or benefits, according to Florida Politics. His existing contract terms are as follows.

Deferred compensation at 30% of a $1.2 million base works out to $360,000 a year, putting his guaranteed annual compensation at about $1.56 million before any bonus.

Board of Governors member Doug Broxson was among several members who offered glowing remarks. "You took over in a difficult time," Broxson told Cartwright, adding that he had run a marathon and "never broken a sweat."

Why trustees backed him

UCF Board of Trustees Chair Alex Martins, a longtime Orlando Magic executive, said the board believes Cartwright is the right leader to continue the university's work. Martins said Cartwright had earned the board's confidence through his record of performance, "his willingness to make difficult decisions" and his commitment to UCF's long-term success.

Martins pointed to several measures of progress under Cartwright:

• UCF met the benchmarks to become a preeminent state research university, which Martins called a defining moment for the school.
• Research expenditures have grown to $292 million.
• UCF is recognized as the nation's No. 5 most innovative public university, Martins said.
• The university landed a $50 million pledge this year, the largest gift in its history.

Martins described those as meaningful results that represent more students graduating, more opportunities for faculty research and a university increasingly positioned to meet Florida's talent and workforce needs.

The road to preeminence

Preeminent status is the Board of Governors' highest designation for state universities. UCF announced in September 2025 that it had met all 12 metrics required for the designation, according to the university. The final metric to fall was the four-year graduation rate, which UCF reported at 63.8%, up 14 percentage points over four years, against a target of 60%.

The university laid out a timeline at the time in which the Board of Governors would verify the metrics, UCF trustees would approve them in spring 2026 and the Board of Governors would certify the designation in June 2026.

The status puts UCF alongside the University of Florida, Florida State University, the University of South Florida and Florida International University. But it no longer brings extra money. The Legislature decided against giving the preeminent schools additional state funding in the 2026-27 budget, Florida Politics reported, removing what had been one of the main financial incentives for reaching the benchmarks.

UCF has also grown more selective. For the summer and fall 2025 terms, the university received a record 65,900 first-year applications for 8,100 spots, and incoming freshmen that fall had an average high school GPA of 4.24 and an average SAT score of 1347, according to UCF.

The record gift

In April, UCF announced a $50 million gift from finance alumnus Barry Miller, a 1995 graduate and president of Florida-based Voloridge Investment Management and Voloridge Health. The gift established the Barry S. Miller College of Business, which the university said will focus on technology-driven business education in fields such as artificial intelligence, financial technology and digital risk. The plan includes five endowed faculty chairs in fintech, AI strategy, cyber risk, and trust and disinformation, along with a new master's degree in technology leadership and innovation.

The gift is a milestone in Go For Launch, UCF's $3.5 billion fundraising campaign. At the time, Cartwright said the gift reinforced that UCF is "being trusted to lead."

Cartwright's tenure

Cartwright became UCF's president in 2020, arriving as the COVID-19 pandemic upended campus life, the difficult period Broxson referenced. He came to Orlando from the University of Missouri, where he was chancellor. In recent years, his contract had been renewed roughly one year at a time.

The three-year term is a change from the short renewals of the past two years, which came with sizable raises. The recent history of his contract, as reported by Florida Politics and WFTV, looks like this.

When the board renewed his deal in early 2025, Martins credited Cartwright with improving four-year graduation rates and helping grow the UCF Foundation's endowment from $163 million to $262 million. A year ago, UCF reported $285 million in research expenditures for 2024-25, a figure that has since risen to the $292 million Martins cited this week.

At the meeting, Cartwright credited his leadership team and pledged to keep working to position the Orlando school for the future. "It really is an honor to be here for three more years," he said. He added that when the university achieves something, his first question is, "What's next?"

What it means for UCF

For UCF's students and the Orlando region, the extension keeps the same leadership in place as the university pursues its next goals in research funding, graduation rates and fundraising under the Go For Launch campaign. It also keeps in place the leader who will oversee the new Barry S. Miller College of Business as it builds out its programs.

What's next

With both the trustees and the Board of Governors on board, Cartwright's contract now runs through December 2029. The university will continue pushing to sustain the preeminence metrics it met, even without the extra state dollars that once came with the designation.