The dean of undergraduate admissions at Yale University, Quinlan is tasked with crafting each new Yale class from an applicant pool that has swelled to more than 30,000 and among his initiatives is the increase in the socioeconomic diversity of the University. His first class, the current freshmen, included nearly 40 percent students of color and 14 percent of students who are the first in their families to enter college.

A Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude graduate of the Yale College Class of 2003, Quinlan was hired as an assistant director in the Office of Undergraduate Admissions upon graduation, and beginning in 2005, he was named director of outreach and recruitment. He left Yale in the summer of 2008 to pursue an MBA at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. He graduated in 2010, earning the Top Student award in the Social Enterprise Department and the Dean’s Distinguished Service Award for “significant and lasting contributions” to the Kellogg community.

After completing his degree, Quinlan returned to New Haven — this time to serve as the deputy dean of undergraduate admissions. In that role, he worked on important strategic decisions, personnel matters and office policy while leading the development of Yale’s approach to the recruitment and selection of students interested in science and engineering.

In the spring of 2011, Quinlan took on the additional responsibility of serving as the inaugural dean of admissions and financial aid for Yale-NUS College, the University’s new campus in Singapore, before being tapped as the dean of undergraduate admissions last year.