<p>How do universities – embedded in a complex social environment comprised of different entities, each with their own logic – frame their mission and identity during periods of change? We examine the marketing materials of universities to answer this question. Using a mixed-methods approach comprised of natural language processing and inductive content analysis, we examine 15 years of quarterly magazines at 8 tuition-driven universities during a period of notable social change from 2000–2014. We use a Latent Dirichlet Allocation topic model to assess vocabulary patterns across 5.9 million words in these universities’ key referential texts that signify their organizational identity. We reveal these universities sought to frame and communicate their identity as they established a logic “constellation” that differentially balanced the coexistence of four societal logics – market, profession, state, and religion. The constellation patterns reveal how universities craft language with agency in entrepreneurial ways to convey different patterns of communication strategies that reflect their efforts to either frame their mission and identity as consistent or adapting. We also emphasize the interior components—or micro-foundations—of an institutional logic by identifying topics that drive the activation of individual logics. We discuss the implications of this work for both higher education and organizational theory.</p>