A four-year program for academic leadership development of department chairpersons is presented as a strategy for institutional renewal. The program has been used successfully with 100 chairpersons, ranging from the various technologies and sciences to the humanities and social sciences. The program is based on three assumptions. First, that the department chairperson is a primary filter affecting academic change and climate within an institution of higher learning. Second, that an academic leadership program is not likely to impact a university if it is not conceived within the context of the characteristics of the professionals who are to participate and the needs of the particular institution that they serve. Third, that academic leadership development, rather than management training, is an organizing concept more congruent with the milieu of the university. The planning and implementation of the program at Rochester Institute of Technology is described. The program consists of twelve yearly seminars held twice a week. Seminar participants are evaluated for: organization style, subject discipline, curriculum planning, management, leadership, internal communication. Interviews, semantic differential tests, organizational perception scales, open-ended questionnaires, and participant-observation were used to evaluate the success of the leadership seminar. Results indicate that after participation in the program department chairpersons made significant new commitments of time and resources to the professional development of their faculty. (Author/SF)