Augustana - Stephanie Herseth Sandlin
Stephanie Herseth Sandlin serves as the 24th president of Augustana University in Sioux Falls, South Dakota — the first woman to lead the university since it was established 163 years ago. As a result of her leadership, the university developed and is implementing its transformational Viking Bold: The Journey to 2030 strategic plan — supported by the largest and most comprehensive campaign in Augustana’s history.
(Full Bio)
Bemidji State - John L. Hoffman, Ph.D.
Dr. John L. Hoffman became president of Bemidji State University and NTC: Bemidji’s Technical College on July 1, 2022. Most recently, Dr. Hoffman served as the vice chancellor for academic and student affairs at the University of Minnesota Crookston.
Dr. Hoffman has spent 30 years working in higher education in roles spanning faculty, academic and student affairs administration, enrollment management, and fundraising. Signature accomplishments have included implementing multi-faceted student success programs credited with increasing student success and retention rates, reducing the first-year retention rate disparities between Black and Indigenous students and students of color and their white counterparts and increasing performance on two-thirds of core learning outcomes for all students during their first year of college. (Full Bio)
Bowling Green State - Dr. Rodney K. Rogers, Ph.D.
Rodney K. Rogers, Ph.D. '81, assumed the role as the 12th president of Bowling Green State University on February 23, 2018, after serving in the interim post since January 1, 2018. Prior to being named president, Rogers had served as provost and senior vice president since 2012 and, before that, dean of the BGSU Schmidthorst College of Business since 2006.
Experienced in both academia and business, Rogers has a Ph.D. from Case Western Reserve University, an MBA from BGSU and a B.A. in music from Ohio Northern University. Before completing his doctorate at Case, he practiced as a CPA for 10 years. (Full Bio)
Ferris State - Dr. Bill Pink Ph.D.
Dr. Pink in July 2022 became Ferris State’s 19th president and is the first African American person to lead the university since it was founded in 1884.
Prior to guiding Ferris State University, Dr. Pink served as president of Grand Rapids Community College in Grand Rapids, Mich. and was vice president for academic affairs at Oklahoma State University-Oklahoma City Campus in Oklahoma.
Dr. Pink is involved in governance and policy development at regional and national levels, sharing expertise and gaining experience to share at Ferris State. (Full Bio)
Lake Superior State - Dr. David Travis, Ph.D.
Dr. David Travis is a graduate of the University of Georgia, where he received his BS (1987) and MA (1989) degrees in Geography. He then went on to Indiana University where he received his doctorate in Geography (1994). All three of his degrees had a concentration in climatology. He began a 30-year career in the Universities of Wisconsin System in 1994 at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater where he spent 24 years teaching, doing research, and eventually moving into administrative positions. He won Outstanding Teaching (2001) and Research (2003) awards during this time. His research on the impacts of aviation on climate change has been published in high-impact journals and is internationally recognized. As an administrator, Dr. Travis served in a variety of roles including Department Chair, Associate Dean for two different colleges, and Dean of the College of Letters & Sciences for his final five years on campus. (Full Bio)
Michigan Tech - Dr. Richard J. Koubek, Ph.D.
Dr. Richard J. Koubek became Michigan Technological University’s 10th president in July 2018, bringing 30 years of higher education experience to the role. In 2015, he was named executive vice president and provost of Louisiana State University (LSU) after serving as dean of the LSU College of Engineering since 2009. Previously, Koubek served as head of Pennsylvania State University’s Harold and Inge Marcus Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering; chair of the Department of Biomedical, Industrial and Human Factors Engineering at Wright State University; and associate dean of research and graduate studies in Wright State’s College of Engineering and Computer Science. (Full Bio)
Minnesota State - Dr. Edward S. Inch, Ph.D.
Since 2016, Dr. Inch has served as provost and vice president for academic affairs at California State University, East Bay, a highly diverse, student-centered, community-engaged university with more than 14,500 students and 850 faculty.
At Cal State East Bay, he focused on improving student outcomes, reducing equity gaps, and increasing access. Some of his accomplishments include leading the redesign of advising and student support services and developing the university’s enrollment management plan, “Strategic Plan for Equitable Student Success,” which yielded a bold, comprehensive, campus-wide strategy to equitably support students from admission through their lifetime as adult learners. He also initiated a tenure track equity hiring program focusing on recruiting and retaining culturally competent professors to reduce equity gaps, support access initiatives, and improve gateway course instruction.
He holds a bachelor’s degree from Western Washington University, a master’s from the University of Oregon, and a doctorate from the University of Washington.
(Full Bio)
Northern Michigan - Gavin Leach ’85, ‘99
Gavin Leach, a Northern Michigan University alumnus who has worked at NMU for 36 years—the last 18 as vice president for Finance and Administration–was named interim president by the NMU Board of Trustees, effective July 1, 2025, while a nationwide search is conducted to replace Dr. Brock Tessman, who held the position from 2023-25.
Leach has worked directly with eight NMU presidents and more than 30 board members. He has also been the treasurer of the NMU Board of Trustees since 2007.
As vice president, Leach has developed and led strategies related to annual and long-term planning for NMU's $200 million yearly operating budget. He has also overseen the university's treasury, finance, budget, technology, facilities, dining and auxiliary, financial aid and Health Center operations. (Full Bio)
St. Thomas - Rob Vischer
Rob Vischer was named the 16th President of the University of St. Thomas on January 1, 2023, after acting as interim president for the previous seven months, beginning in June 2022.
In nearly 10 years as dean of the St. Thomas School of Law, Vischer has helped leverage the law school's mission to achieve critical objectives in student success and community impact. Over the course of his deanship, the law school has dramatically improved employment outcomes for its graduates, built a global student body by establishing partnerships with law schools in more than a dozen countries, redoubled its commitment to whole-person professional formation, maintained its top-25 ranking for scholarly impact, and made racial justice core to its mission. The Harvard Law School graduate was an inaugural recipient of the Minnesota Lawyer Diversity and Inclusion Award for his contributions to the advancement of diversity and inclusion in the practice of law.
Before entering the legal academy, Vischer was associated with Kirkland & Ellis in Chicago, where he practiced corporate litigation. He clerked for three federal judges: Judge David Ebel of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Joan Gottschall of the Northern District of Illinois, and Judge John Wiese of the Court of Federal Claims. He received his B.A. degree, summa cum laude, from the University of New Orleans, and his J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. (Full Bio)