Three Women Appointed to Diversity Positions at Colleges and Universities

Linda Strong-Leek, provost a Haverford College in Pennsylvania has been given the added duties of the college’s interim chief diversity officer. She became provost this past August after serving for five years as provost a Berea College in Kentucky. Prior to joining the faculty at Berea College in 2002, Dr. Strong-Leek taught at Florida International University in Miami. She is the author of Excising the Spirit: A Literary Analysis of Female Circumcision (Africa World Press, 2009).

Dr. Strong-Leek holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English from North Carolina Central University in Durham. She earned a Ph.D. in English with concentrations in African and African American literature and African American history at Michigan State University.

Enobong “Anna” Branch has been promoted to senior vice president for equity at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. She had been serving as vice chancellor for diversity, inclusion, and community engagement at Rutgers. Earlier, Dr. Branch was associate chancellor for equity and inclusion and a professor of sociology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Dr. Branch is a graduate of Howard University in Washington, D.C., where she majored in biology. She holds a Ph.D. in sociology from the University at Albany of the State University of New York System.

Shaniqua Crawford was appointed institutional equity officer, equal opportunity officer, and Title IX coordinator at the University of Oklahoma. She has been serving as Title IX coordinator and as director of equity at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin.

Crawford is a graduate of Georgia Southern University, where she majored in history and philosophy. She earned a juris doctorate at Ohio Northern University.