Throughout his eight-year SUNY Cortland presidency until his retirement on July 1, 2003, Judson H. Taylor strongly advocated for SUNY Cortland intercollegiate athletics.
He oversaw a major renovation of the campus athletic facilities, was the driving force behind the College building its $18 million Stadium Complex and was the visionary who brought the 2002 Empire State Games to Cortland.
Taylor endorsed the addition of women's ice hockey and women's golf as intercollegiate sports and he converted 11 part-time Cortland coaching positions to full time lines. He supported the creation of an Athletic Department replacing the Athletic Office at the College. He persuaded the SUNY Cortland students to increase funding in support of athletics.
Taylor and his wife, Elise, were regular spectators at all the Cortland athletic events and even traveled to Australia in 1996 with the Cortland field hockey team. His concern for Cortland's student-athletes was exhibited time and again. When Cortland's successful senior baseball players had to miss Commencement to compete at the NCAA World Series, Taylor personally presented them with their diplomas at their Virginia venue.
During Taylor's presidency, SUNY Cortland became one of a select few NCAA Division III institutions to annually finish among the Top 20 in the Sears Directors Cup standings, emblematic of overall athletic excellence. At the national level, Taylor served on the influential National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) President's Council.
Taylor worked with College Council Chair Stephen Hunt and state legislators to fund the College's state-of-the-art stadium complex, a facility that will benefit both the College and community. Then, to showcase the new venue, he brought the 25th Annual Empire State Games to Cortland, which became the smallest city to ever host America's oldest and largest state games. As part of that effort, he approved enhancements to Cortland's bleachers, scoreboards, fences and press boxes, having already redone the gymnasium floor.
In 1998, Taylor received the Fraser Stokes Award for outstanding service to Cortland athletics. A native of Portland, Ore., Taylor earned a B.A. in education in 1960 and an M.Ed. in counseling from the University of Oregon in 1962. He received a Ph.D. in educational psychology from Arizona State University in 1969.
From 1970-92, he was a member of the faculty at California State University at Dominguez Hills. While there, he served as a professor of educational psychology, Graduate Education Department chair, director of learning assistance and testing, and dean of the School of Education. Taylor has had extensive international experience as well. In 1969-70, he was a school psychologist with Department of Defense schools in Japan. He was a Fulbright Scholar in Lisbon in 1979, working with Portugal's Ministry of Education and Culture. Taylor served as an educational evaluation consultant for a USAID/San Diego State project in Brazil from 1974-76 and received a Foreign Service Award from San Diego State for his work. In 1983, Taylor served as a visiting professor at the Boston University World Bank project in Lisbon.
Prior to arriving in Cortland, Taylor had been provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls for three years. The Taylors are the parents of two children: Nanci and Catherine, and have four grandchildren.
