Leslie Rodriguez-McClellon has been named the seventeenth president of Arkansas Baptist College, a historically Black institution in Little Rock.
According to the Department of Education’s most recent data, Arkansas Baptist College enrolls roughly 500 students, 84 percent of whom are Black.
Dr. Rodriguez-McClellon comes to her new role from historically Black Saint Augustine’s University in Raleigh, North Carolina, where she served as vice president of community relations and governmental affairs for the past three years. Last year, she had a brief stint as the university’s acting president.
Earlier in her career, Dr. Rodriguez-McClellon served as the first African American president of Rochester Community and Technical College in Minnesota. She has held senior student affairs and strategic leadership roles with several institutions, including Southern University at Shreveport, a HBCU in Louisiana; the Community College of Denver in Colorado; Arizona Western College; and Langston University, a HBCU in Oklahoma.
Dr. Rodriguez-McClellon earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in education from Langston University. She holds a doctorate in adult learning and leadership from Kansas State University.
