In 2004 he was appointed the President of Shimer College, where he also served as a Professor of English, Education, and the Humanities. Amid controversy, the Shimer College Board of Trustees announced in January 2006 that at his urging it had accepted an invitation to move the school to the Illinois Institute of Technology campus on the south side of Chicago. The move was completed in August of the same year. In August 2007 he left Shimer in order to accept a position with the NEH. He also served as a Visitor of Ralston College. On June 20, 2016, he died of a heart attack while traveling for an NEH site visit in Philadelphia.