President Donald Trump has appointed Johnny C. Taylor Jr. as chair of the President’s Board of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Since November 2017, Taylor has been serving as the CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management. Earlier, from 2010 to 2017 he was president of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, an organization supporting the nation’s state-operated HBCUs.
In accepting the post, Taylor noted that “every year, over 300,000 students turn to these institutions for their education and to prepare them for their careers. This president’s advisory board can be a nexus between higher educational institutions and employers and support innovations in work-based learning opportunities for HBCU students.”
A native of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Taylor was the valedictorian of his high school class and is a graduate of the University of Miami, where he majored in communication. He earned a master’s degree and a law degree at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.