Seven Women Who Have Been Selected for New Administrative Posts in Higher Education

Susan Gross was appointed vice provost for enrollment management at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark. She was assistant vice president for enrollment management at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. Earlier, Gross was university director of financial aid at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Madison, New Jersey, and interim dean of admissions and financial aid at New York Law School.

Gross is a graduate of Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pennsylvania, where she majored in communications. She holds a master’s degree in student personnel administration from New York University.

Stacey R. Miller has been named director of alumni engagement at Western Carolina Univerity in Cullowhee, North Carolina. She is the former associate athletics director for student success at the university.

Miller earned a bachelor’s degree in sport management and business administration from Barton College in Wilson, North Carolina. She holds a master’s degree in sport administration from East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina.

Nicole J. Johnson has been named vice president for student life at Rhodes College in Memphis, effective February 27. She has been serving as dean of students and associate vice president for student affairs at Goucher College in Baltimore. Before joining Goucher College in 2018, Johnson served as assistant dean and director of the office of student engagement at Elizabeth City State University in North Carolina.

Johnson earned a bachelor’s degree in African American world studies from the University of Iowa. She holds a master’s degree in college student personnel from Arkansas Tech University and is a Ph.D. candidate in the higher education program at Virginia Tech.

Mary George Opperman has been appointed the senior vice president and secretary to the board of trustees at Syracuse University in New York. She has been on the staff at Cornell University for the past 20 years, most recently as vice president and chief human resources officer.

Opperman earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from the State University of New York at Oneonta. She holds a master’s degree in organizational behavior from Cornell University.

Joelle Lester was promoted to executive director of the Public Health Law Center at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota. Lester joined the center in 2012 and for the past five years, she has served as the center’s director of commercial tobacco control programs.

Lester earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology and women’s studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She holds a juris doctorate from the University of Minnesota Law School.

Tasha Bibb has joined the Mississippi State University Office of Technology Management as a senior program manager in the Center for Entrepreneurship and Outreach’s new office in Vicksburg. She is the former director of entrepreneurial development and ecosystem builder with Innovate Mississippi.

Bibb is a graduate of Mississippi College, where she majored in business administration and marketing. She holds an MBA from Jackson State University in Mississippi.

Kristi L. Anderson is the inaugural chief strategy officer at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. She is the former director of graduate medical education at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center/University Hospital and Clinics in Lafayette.

Dr. Anderson holds a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology and a master’s degree in clinical exercise physiology from Louisiana State University. She earned a Ph.D. in systemic studies from the University of Louisiana at Monroe.