Alcorn State University reduced its administration, reemphasizing enrollment management and to more clearly align the services provided by the university with its mission and strategic goals.
President M. Christopher Brown II maintained five divisions, creating a Division of Student Success and Enrollment Management, among other changes. The newly created Division of Academic and Student Affairs merges instruction and student support services eliminating the stand-alone Student Affairs administrative unit.
“The changes create greater efficiencies and bring a greater focus on enrollment management, ensuring students better progress through the higher education process: recruiting, admissions, retention, graduation, and career placement,” says Executive Vice President and Provost Samuel L. White as he speaks to the visionary leadership of the new administrative structure. “Our next step is a restructure of our academic departments and schools.”
The changes reinforce Alcorn’s commitment to excellence and effective communication and engagement with its stakeholders.
With recent federal financial aid requirements and a new state performance funding formula, the University is being more focused and intentional, establishing a very solid strategic enrollment management philosophy.
No one was terminated by the realignment changes, but Alcorn merged some vacant posts, accepted one resignation, thereby creating new positions. The Office of the President reduced its executive team by reassigning five positions throughout the campus budget.
On August 19, 2013, Carl Cunningham Jr., Ph.D., will join Alcorn as the Vice President for Student Success and Enrollment Management. He brings over 13 years’ experience in higher education providing leadership and organizational development in the strategic enrollment management and engagement fields.
Most recently, Cunningham served as the director of the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs at the University of South Alabama where he established their strategic enrollment management model. During his tenure at the University of South Alabama, the university experienced record growth while reaching new student populations and monitoring those students academic success. Cunningham earned both his master’s degree in geography and his doctorate degree in higher education administration from the University of Southern Mississippi.
“I am indeed honored to be a member of the Alcorn family. It is exciting to be returning to Mississippi,” says Dr. Cunningham. “Alcorn possesses an excellent reputation and impressive record of institutional success with an innovative president who empowers not only his faculty and staff, but the entire Alcorn family.”
President Brown plans to discuss the realignment in detail at the annual Alcorn Encampment scheduled for August 19, which brings together faculty, staff, alumni and community leaders to kick off the academic year while conversing about where we are and where we want to go together.
Alcorn has taken a critical look at its instructional and infrastructure needs including on-campus space—housing and classrooms, and Alcorn must “align its growth” with existing marketing and enrollment strategies for our students, says Senior Vice President and COO Betty Roberts.
“By adopting budget performance measures for each administrative process as well as for the shared vision of the university, we will bring focus and discipline to our mission,” further explains Dr. Roberts as she discussed the benefits of five-year projections and the connection between enrollment management and knowledge of institutional budgets and funding.
President Brown began this process last year engaging the campus leadership team and constituents groups. Brown did doctoral-level research on the effectiveness of university’s structures and incorporated strategies from best practice institutions that have proven successful.
“At Alcorn, we value our students,” says President Brown. “And understand that this is an institution-wide responsibility, we will ensure the success of our students every step of the way. Our commitment does not end at graduation, post graduate employment planning and strategies are imperative in this constantly changing and competitive environment.”
This new structure supports communication of the University’s initiatives, decisions and progress, and insures prompt delivery and consistency at every level of Alcorn.
-ALCORN-
Alcorn State University is a premier comprehensive land-grant university that develops diverse students into globally-competitive leaders, and applies scientific research through collaborative partnerships that benefit the surrounding communities, state, nation, and world.
Posted By: Reginald Culpepper
Wednesday, August 14th 2013 at 2:02PM
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