After a career spanning 40 years, (25 at the dean and vice president level), Robert J. Massa took on a new challenge in September 2014 as a strategic leader in Lafayette College's recently launched $400 million capital campaign. Prior to accepting that role, Dr. Massa served for 5 years as Lafayette's VP for Communications. He applied extensive experience in college admissions and public relations with a keen understanding of the higher education system to promote Lafayette College in Easton, PA through multiple channels, including electronic and print media, news services, creative agencies, and athletic communications. Bob Massa's duties included the design of a marketing plan to distinguish the school in the higher education market.

Robert J. Massa began his higher education career as a graduate student at the University of Rochester in NY, where he served as an intern in the college's admissions office. The following year, after receiving a M.Ed. in educational psychology, he accepted a full-time position as Student Aid Counselor at Columbia University's Teachers College. While at Columbia in 1975, he earned a MA in higher education. He went on to Colgate University in Hamilton, NY, where he served as Asst. Director of Student Aid and Asst. Dean of Admissions and subsequently earned a doctorate in education from Columbia in 1980.

The next 9 years brought Robert Massa to Union College in Schenectady, NY, and subsequently to Trinity University in San Antonio, TX, leading student aid and admissions. In 1989, he became Dean of Enrollment at Johns Hopkins U in Baltimore, where he established and led an innovative department of enrollment research, dedicated to scientific study into students' college choices and tuition activities. Ten years later, Robert Massa brought this same approach to Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where he increased tuition revenue and transformed the college's outreach efforts to prospective students He remained at Dickinson as VP for Enrollment & College Relations until 2009, including 18 months as Interim VP for Development.

Now, Robert Joseph Massa combines his duties at Lafayette with consulting work on enrollment management at various colleges and speaking engagements at high schools on the college admissions process. He has written numerous articles on enrollment issues and is a regular contributer to the Chronicle of Higher Education and the New York Times.