Christine Johnson McPhail Is the New President of Saint Augustine’s University in Raleigh, North Carolina

The board of trustees at Saint Augustine’s University in Raleigh, North Carolina, has announced the appointment of Christine Johnson McPhail as the university’s thirteenth president. The appointment is effective immediately. Dr. McPhail was married to Irving Pressley McPhail, who died last fall as a result of complications of COVID-19. He was the twelfth president of Saint Augustine’s University.

Saint Augustine’s University enrolls about 900 students, according to the most recent data available from the U.S. Department of Education. Women make up 44 percent of the student body.

“I am both humbled and honored to have been selected by the Saint Augustine’s University board of trustees to serve as its next president,” said Dr. McPhail. “I am committed to the success of this university and each of its students. I also feel a responsibility to carry on my late husband’s work to establish the university as a 21st-century, learning-centered institution while at the same time leaning on several decades of experience in higher education leadership and strong partnerships with the SAU community to move us forward.”

Dr. McPhail has been serving as a professor of practice at the John E. Roueche Center for Community College Leadership at Kansas State University. Earlier, she was the founding professor and director of the Community College Leadership Doctoral Program at Morgan State University in Baltimore. Prior to her role at Morgan State University, Dr. McPhail served as president of Cypress College in California.

Her latest book, Transformational Change: Becoming an Equity-Centered Higher Education Institution (Stylus Publishing), co-authored with Kimberly Beatty, is slated for publication this spring.

Dr. McPhail holds a master’s degree from California State University and a doctorate in higher education administration from the Unversity of Southern California.