A Dozen Universities Announce the Appointments of Women to Administrative Positions

Towana Moore has been appointed vice president for administration and finance at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Moore has served as interim vice president for the past six months. She has worked at the university since 1999 in a variety of capacities, including most recently serving as associate vice president for business services.

Moore earned a bachelor’s degree in business and an MBA from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.

Kelly Fox has been named vice president for finance and administration at Rice University in Houston, Texas. She has been serving as executive vice president and chief budget officer at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Earlier, she was executive vice chancellor and chief operating officer at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Fox is a graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She earned a master of public administration degree from the University of Colorado Denver.

Nicole Whitehead is the new vice president of human resources at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. She was the chief human resources officer at Joliet Junior College in Illinois.

Dr. Whitehead earned a bachelor’s degree in business and an MBA from Lewis University in Romeoville, Illinois. She went on to earn a doctorate in higher education and organizational change from Benedictine University in Lisle, Illinois.

Jennifer Griffin has been named the inaugural vice president for public safety at Temple University in Philadelphia. Since 2019, she has been a captain for the Delaware State Police. Dr. Griffin has served as an adjunct professor in the department of sociology and criminal justice at the University of Delaware since 2013.

Dr. Griffin earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Millersville University in Pennsylvania. She holds a master’s degree in the administration of justice from Wilmington University in Delaware and a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Delaware.

Carol Crabbe was appointed assistant dean of the Scripps Howard School of Journalism and Communications at Hampton University in Virginia. Since 2008, she was been an international strategic public relations consultant for Wilson Global Communications.

A native of Ghana, Crabbe earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, and a master’s degree in media and public affairs from George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

Brianne Burcke has been named associate vice chancellor for finance and chief of staff at Washington University in St. Louis. Burcke has nearly 10 years of experience in higher education, formerly serving as assistant controller and director of financial planning and budget at Saint Louis University.

Burcke earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a master’s degree in accounting from Saint Louis University.

Joy Hill was named director of human resources and talent management at Virginia Union Unversity in Richmond. Earlier, she held human resource positions at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Dentistry, and Virginia State University.

Hill is a graduate of Virginia Union University, where she majored in social work. She holds a master’s degree in human resource management from Capella University.

Martina Nieswandt has been named the new vice president for research at Chapman University in Orange, California. She was associate vice chancellor for research and engagement at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Earlier, she was an associate professor of science education at the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Dr. Nieswandt holds a master’s degree from Ruhr University in Bochum, Germany, and a Ph.D. from Christian-Albrechts-University in Kiel, Germany.

Jan Sobolik has been promoted to associate director of the Research and Technology Park at North Dakota State University in Fargo. She was the operations manager and has been on the staff for 20 years.

Sobolik studied business administration at Minnesota State University Moorhead.

Suzanne Price is the new assistant vice president for auxiliary enterprises at Clemson University in South Carolina. Since 2015, she has been the director of residential learning at the university. She first joined the university’s staff in 1998.

Dr. Price graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Columbia College in South Carolina in 1996. She holds a master’s degree in counseling and guidance services and a Ph.D. in educational leadership from Clemson University.

Tracy Worthy was appointed chief human resources officer at Winston-Salem State University in North Carolina. She was the director of talent acquisition at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Worthy graduated from Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte with a bachelor’s degree in sociology. She earned a master of public administration degree from the University of North Carolina at Pembroke and is currently enrolled in the doctorate in business administration program at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Polly Ericksen is the inaugural director of the Food Systems Research Center at the University of Vermont, a collaborative partnership between the university and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service. She spent the past nine years as the program leader for sustainable livestock systems with the International Livestock Research Institute in Nairobi, Kenya.

Dr. Ericksen is a graduate of Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, where she majored n history. She holds a master’s degree in economics and a Ph.D. in soil science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.