Five African American Men Who Are Stepping Down From Their Posts in Higher Education

Winston B. Crisp, vice chancellor for student affairs at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, will retire this month after more than 26 years of service to the university. He first began working at Chapel Hill as the assistant dean for student affairs for the School of Law. He later became the school’s associate dean for student services. He joined Student Affairs as assistant vice chancellor for student affairs and dean of students. He was named vice chancellor in 2010.

Crisp holds a bachelor’s degree from Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, North Carolina, and a law degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Corey D.B. Walker has announced he will step down from his roles as vice president of mission integration and dean of the Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology at Virginia Union University. He will remain with the university as a professor and scholar-in-residence and continue to teach in the areas of religion and society.

Dr. Walker holds a bachelor’s degree in finance from Norfolk State University in Virginia, a master of divinity degree from Virginia Union University, a master of theological studies from Harvard Divinity School, and a Ph.D. in American studies from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Donald Cole, assistant provost, assistant to the chancellor for multicultural affairs, and associate professor of mathematics at the University of Mississippi, has announced he will retire on January 15, 2019. Dr. Cole has a longstanding history with Ole Miss which started when he was an undergraduate engineering major. In 1970, he took part in a protest at an Up with People concert on campus and was expelled from the university along with seven other students. Despite this expulsion, he went on to lead a successful academic career. In 1993, he became assistant dean in the Graduate School and associate professor of mathematics at the University of Mississippi and has been a university employee ever since.

Dr. Cole holds a bachelor’s degree from Tougaloo College in Mississippi, a master’s degree in mathematics from the State University of New York, a master’s degree in mathematics from the University of Michigan, and a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Mississippi.

Cliff Thornton, associate dean of admission at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, has announced he will retire at the end of the Spring 2019 semester. He began his career at Wesleyan in 1985 and has been an administrator at the university ever since. Throughout his tenure, he has been dedicated to recruiting students of color and has been instrumental in establishing and leading the school’s historic commitment to a diverse and academically elite student body.

Stanley Pritchett, president of historically Black Morris Brown College in Atlanta, has announced he will retire on December 31, 2018. He began his career at Morris Brown as an administrator in 2006 and became the school’s 18th president in 2010. When he began his presidency, the school was facing several lawsuits and was more than $30 million dollars in debt. During his tenure, the institution emerged from bankruptcy in 2015 and had $10 million in debt forgiven by the U.S. Department of Education. President Pritchett oversaw several fundraising efforts and restructured the college. Even though the school is still unaccredited, Pritchett says that about 50 percent of all Morris Brown undergraduates go on to graduate school.

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