Radford University — 2021–Present

Professor and Chair, Department of Political Science Acting Chair, Department of Sociology (2025–2026)

The Situation in 2021

When I arrived at Radford University in August 2021, the Political Science department had 81 declared students — majors and minors combined — no coherent enrollment strategy, limited external program partnerships, and a curriculum that had not been systematically reviewed in years. The department was the fourth largest of eight in the College of Humanities and Behavioral Sciences, but it was not growing and it had no particular reason to expect that it would.

Five years later it is the fastest-growing department in the college, with 409 declared students, an 87 percent retention rate, five active minor programs, two 3+2 graduate partnerships with Virginia Tech and George Mason University, a nationally recognized civic engagement record, and a co-founded statewide legislative simulation conducted annually on the floor of the Virginia House of Delegates.

That transformation did not happen by accident. It was the result of deliberate, sustained work across every dimension of departmental leadership — curriculum, recruitment, advising, faculty development, fiscal management, community building, and external engagement — executed simultaneously and in coordination.

Enrollment and Retention

The 405 percent enrollment growth from 81 to 409 students is the most visible outcome of the Radford chapter, but the retention figure may be the more meaningful one. Retention improved from 78 percent to 87 percent — a nine-point gain that reflects something deeper than recruitment success. Students who stay are students who found what they came looking for. Building that requires getting the curriculum right, building the advising relationships that catch students before they disengage, creating the physical spaces and social infrastructure that make a department feel like a community worth belonging to, and preparing students for what comes after graduation well enough that they can see the path forward from where they are standing.

The tools that produced that retention improvement include a revised advising model that integrates faculty mentorship earlier and more deliberately, a new Careers course added to the curriculum to complement the existing Internship course, internship pipelines built with the City of Radford, Pulaski County, and the Virginia legislature, and a systematic overhaul of how the department communicates with students at risk of attrition.

Curriculum and Program Development

The curriculum I inherited was functional but static. What I built in its place is a dynamic, scaffolded program aligned with Radford's REAL general education framework, designed to attract students from across the university and retain them through coherent pathways from introductory coursework to capstone experiences.

The specific program-building accomplishments at Radford include:

New minors and programs. The Legal Studies minor, developed in coordination with the Criminal Justice department, grew from inception to more than 150 enrolled students. The Wicked Problems minor, built around Radford's distinctive Wicked Initiatives program, provided a curricular home for students engaged in the university's signature interdisciplinary initiative. The Leadership Studies and International Studies minors were expanded and repositioned within the REAL framework to serve students across colleges.

Graduate pathway partnerships. I negotiated 3+2 bachelor's-to-master's curriculum agreements with Virginia Tech and George Mason University, creating accelerated pathways to graduate education that directly serve our students' career ambitions and differentiate our undergraduate programs in a competitive market.

High-impact practices. The share of departmental courses incorporating high-impact practices grew from 27 percent in 2021 to 78 percent in 2026 — a transformation in the pedagogical culture of the department that directly supports both student learning outcomes and retention.

Assessment. I overhauled the departmental assessment program to make data collection sustainable and useful, deploying AAC&U VALUE rubrics and a centralized assessment data storehouse that reduced the administrative burden on faculty while improving the quality of the evidence available for program improvement.

Fiscal and Physical Investment

The departmental budget I manage is modest, but the decisions made within it have had outsized impact on the department's culture and trajectory. I reallocated technology funds to faculty travel support during a period of university-level budget cuts, protecting junior faculty's ability to remain professionally active at a moment when institutional resources were contracting. I deployed seed funding from the departmental budget to support the Wicked Initiatives program in its early stages, an investment that leveraged significantly larger internal and external support as the program proved its value.

On the physical side, I repurposed underutilized departmental space to create two new student environments: the Public Policy and Democracy Lab and the Student Community Center. Both spaces were designed deliberately — not as amenities but as infrastructure for the student community I was trying to build. Students who have no shared space have no shared culture, and shared culture is what retention is ultimately built on. I secured internal strategic funding for the renovations and furnished the spaces to create an environment that signals to students that the department has invested in them.

I also secured external funding across multiple grants and awards, including voter engagement grants, survey research equipment support through a Kettering Foundation proposal, and student space renovation funding — building an external revenue portfolio that reduces dependence on institutional budget allocations for priority initiatives.

Civic Engagement

The civic engagement work at Radford represents the fullest expression to date of a commitment that has organized my career since 2003. Highlanders Vote, which I built from scratch after arriving in 2021, has earned Voter Friendly Campus designation across three consecutive election cycles and the ALL IN Most Engaged Campus designation in 2024 — the highest recognition available from the two leading national campus voter engagement organizations.

The Virginia Government Simulation, which I co-founded in 2024 with colleague Amanda Wintersieck, brings student delegates from across Virginia together on the floor of the Virginia House of Delegates each fall to draft, debate, and vote on legislation under authentic parliamentary rules. It is the only statewide program of its kind in Virginia, has earned APSA and Pi Sigma Alpha grant support in its inaugural year, and has been documented in a peer-reviewed article published in the Journal of Political Science Education in 2026.

I also deployed a campus-wide assessment of incoming student civic knowledge and skills — the Civic Incomes project — providing a baseline measure against which the department can track civic development across the undergraduate experience. That project has been presented at both the ADP Annual Summit and the APSA Teaching and Learning Conference, and represents a methodological contribution to the field of civic education assessment.

Acting Chair of Sociology — 2025–2026

In March 2025 I was asked to serve as Acting Chair of the Department of Sociology while the department's elected chair completed a transition. That appointment — supervising eight faculty, one staff member, and three degree programs across a department I had not previously led — tested and demonstrated a different dimension of my administrative capacity: the ability to walk into an unfamiliar unit, build trust quickly, make operational decisions under uncertainty, and stabilize a department experiencing leadership transition.

During that acting appointment I overhauled the scheduling system to integrate student demand data and create sustainable faculty rotations, engaged the faculty in a strategic planning process, reallocated resources to support the Center for Social and Cultural Research, negotiated changes in foundation fund usage to enhance African American Studies support, and helped furnish a dedicated Black Studies Center for student community-building. I also mentored pre-tenure faculty in the department and coordinated with the Black Student Union on a regular town hall program for students of color.

The Sociology appointment ends in 2026 with the installation of the department's elected chair. I supported the transition by developing a ten-week chair training plan for incoming leadership — one final act of community investment before returning full attention to Political Science.

University Service

Beyond departmental leadership, I have contributed to Radford's institutional governance in a range of capacities: member of the General Education Implementation Committee, the Academic Policies and Procedures Committee, the CHBS SMART Lab Advisory Board, the Center for Social and Cultural Research Advisory Board, and the Council of Chairs. I also served on the Davis College of Business and Economics Interim Dean Search Committee in 2023 — a direct window into how dean searches function from the inside and an opportunity to contribute to an institutional decision of lasting consequence.