Penny L. Elkins was announced as Mercer University’s 19th president on Friday, Nov. 14, 2025 in the University Center’s Heritage Hall.
The election was held at Mercer’s founding ground – Penfield, Ga. – on Friday morning and was a unanimous decision by the 12-member search committee assembled in April. While the search for the University’s next president cast a nationwide net, the search committee ultimately chose a longtime Mercerian.
Elkins has worked at Mercer as a member of the faculty and administration for 25 years and will be the first Mercer graduate to lead the school in 47 years. Her presidency will begin on Jan. 1, 2026 and will mark a new era for Mercer as she will be the first female president since the University was founded in 1833.
"This institution has shaped every part of who I am and what I believe about education, about opportunity, about leadership and about purpose," Elkins said Friday.
The University, she said, is the "most impactful private national research university" of its size in the country, adding that under her leadership, Mercer will continue to be focused on academics and the learning outcomes of its student body.
“There is no greater woman, no greater leader, no greater example of what a Bear should be,” SGA President Alisha Mitchell ‘26 said. “She has such a huge connection with the students and she knows what the campus culture is, so that’s beautiful.”
Mitchell added that when she heard Elkins would assume office in January, “I could just feel it in my chest that this was going to be a great new era for Mercer and for Mercer students in general.”
During her two and a half decades at Mercer, Elkins systematically rose through the ranks and built a familiarity with the University’s networks and campuses. She has served as the University’s interim provost since February, and she was named executive vice president in October 2023.
The decision to elect Elkins, Dean of Students Douglas Pearson said, will ensure that the University will be “able to hit the ground running” in the spring semester and continue along the trajectory set by outgoing President William D. Underwood. She will be just the fourth new president at Mercer in the last six decades, following Underwood, and Kirby Godsey.
“She’s going to be able to come in unlike any other president, especially someone from the outside and be able to take us, without missing a beat, to the next level,” Pearson said.
Elkins said she recognized that the path ahead will not be walked alone, nor a walk in the park, but today's challenges are only part of the "meaningful and fulfilling" work that she will embrace in the coming years.
“The Board of Trustees has made the best choice imaginable in electing Dr. Penny Elkins to serve as the 19th president of Mercer University,” Underwood said in a press release. “She will be an amazing president, given her exceptional and demonstrated leadership, relational and problem-solving talents. I can hardly wait to watch Mercer flourish in the coming years under her leadership.”
Underwood, whose tenure at the helm of Mercer is ending in December after 18 years, will retire from administrative work but will continue to teach at Mercer’s Walter F. George School of Law.
Gabriel Kopp '26 is double majoring in Journalism and Law and Public Policy at Mercer University. He has written for The Cluster since he started at Mercer, and currently works as Editor-in-Chief. When he isn't working on a Washington Post crossword, he enjoys going for runs around Macon and reading The New York Times or the AJC while sipping coffee.
