In 1908, Guth was appointed to serve as president of the University of the Pacific, which he advocated renaming to College of the Pacific. He stayed in this position for five years and published four written works.
Goucher College
In 1913, Guth was selected to serve as president of Goucher College and subsequently took residence at the college's campus in Baltimore. During his tenure, Guth orchestrated the construction of several new residence halls, including the Alumnae Lodge, and a successful million-dollar fundraising campaign, which enabled the college to reduce its debts, augment its endowment, and purchase the plot of land that would eventually become its Towson campus. As Goucher's president, Guth voiced strong public support for women's education in the United States, telling the New York Times in December 1920, shortly after the ratification of the 19th amendment granting women's suffrage, "In the co-educational institution, everything is done from the viewpoint of men, and women receive the sort of education that men, who are more enthusiastic about the education of the male sex than they are about higher opportunities for women, can give her." In the course of his administration, Guth at one point corresponded with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, whose daughter Jessie had graduated from Goucher. Wilson wrote Guth in 1918 to express concern over the dismissal of faculty member Hans Froelicher, saying, "I have known so much of Doctor Froelicher through my daughters, and have formed so favorable an impression of him by direct contact with him, that I am sure that if any such impression on the part of the Trustees exists, it must be based upon some cruel misunderstanding. I beg that you will believe I am prompted to write this letter only by genuine regard for a man whom I very much esteem and without the least desire to thrust my counsel, uninvited, into the deliberations of the authorities of the college." By 1920, Guth had grown increasingly concerned about the continued viability of the college's Baltimore campus and had begun, with the consent of Goucher's board of trustees, searching for a suitable location in the nearby suburbs. He settled on a 421-acre plot of land in Towson, Marylandk that had belonged to the estate of a wealthy Baltimore family. In 1921, under Guth's direction, the college purchased the land for approximately $150,000. The move was not completed until 1953, having been delayed by financial difficulties at the college during World War II and the Great Depression.
Later years
Declining health and death
In the final years of his presidency at Goucher, Guth suffered significant health problems, though he remained in the position until his death in 1929 at the age of 57. Faculty member Hans Froelicher, whom Guth had previously dismissed, was appointed in his place as acting president as the college searched for a successor.
Interment
Guth was initially buried at Druid Ridge Cemetery in Pikesville, Maryland. When his wife Helen died in 1959, Goucher fulfilled her request that her and her late-husband's remains be cremated and interred at the Guth Memorial Gate at the entrance to Goucher's campus in Towson, which was completed in 1953, 24 years after his death. The gate itself was built years earlier with a donation from Guth's wife.
