Ryerson president Sheldon Levy — widely hailed as an urban game-changer who has re-drawn the face of the downtown Toronto campus — announced Tuesday he will leave the university when his second term ends in 2015.

Levy, who has raised the profile of the fledgling university since taking office in 2005, will be 65 when he turns over the reins to a new president. The personable academic leader, whose informal, open-door policy has made him popular among staff and students alike, helped make the campus more student-friendly with gardens and a long-sought pedestrian mall along Gould St., and has brought the once-hidden campus right out to Yonge St.

One of his most famous legacies is the new athletic centre Levy spearheaded on the site of historic Maple Leaf Gardens, a deal made affordable by partnering with Loblaw, which opened a flagship store on the ground floor.

The Maple Leaf Gardens deal, which gave Ryerson a new hockey rink, gym and other student facilities, stands out, Levy said in an interview Tuesday.

“For a kid that grew up in Toronto, you can’t help but think the Gardens was a special moment. For sure, that I’ll remember forever,” he said, noting students strongly supported the project, chipping in fees toward the athletic centre.

“We had athletic facilities for a student population of about 8,000 and we were now 24,000. We needed something new and we went really from the worst to the first in one big jump. To make that kind of leap was exciting.”

Levy also oversaw a new glass-enclosed Ryerson Image Centre and new award-winning Student Learning Centre being built on the site of the former Sam the Record Man.

But it was Levy’s dream of stopping the exodus of techno-savvy grads to Silicon Valley that inspired Ryerson’s Digital Media Zone, an “incubator” that gives entrepreneurial students somewhere to brainstorm and meet possible investors in their ideas, from apps to new software. It has spawned so many start-up companies, Prince Charles made it a stop on his last visit to Canada.

“The talents of our students gave us the opportunity to create an incubator and no one, including myself,” said Levy, “ever imagined it would take off like it did.” Located in the Yonge-Dundas complex on the northeast corner, the DMZ started out at 5,000 sq ft and is now 10 times that size, he said.

Levy is surely the only university president ever to receive a cow as a gift. In 2012 the grateful Maasi father of graduating international student Teriano Lesancha bequested a live cow to “Bwana Levy” in thanks for the school’s financial and moral support of their daughter as she earned her social work degree.

Levy travelled to Teriano’s Kenyan village in the summer of 2012 to not only receive the cow — the highest currency in the herding culture — but to re-create the convocation ceremony for villagers in this rural community, complete with robes and recorded processional music. He donated the cow back to the village and together with then-chancellor Raymond Chang, contributed enough cows to help launch the foundation Teriano has created to educate other girls in this once-illiterate community.

Levy said he doesn’t plan to work full-time after leaving Ryerson, and ruled out any interest in running for public office. Instead, he said he’d like to do advocacy work on behalf of young people.

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“I would like to lend my voice to champion opportunities for young people, but that’s not a job, that’s sort of an advocacy position on behalf of the younger generation.”

Before Ryerson, Levy was the president of Sheridan College and held various vice-president positions at the University of Toronto, University of Ontario Institute of Technology and York University.

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