Madame President “


University; and we’ve kept the cost of attendance affordable to provide greater access to students seeking a college degree,” Cynthia notes.


In 2017, CSU was named the Historically Black College and University of the Year by HBCU Digest. More recently, in 2018, HBCU Digest also named CSU’s College of Business Summer Banking Institute the Academic Program of the Year.


Central State University fosters academic excellence within a nurturing environment and provides a strong liberal arts foundation, as well as science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM), and agriculture curriculum. This leads to professional careers and advanced studies globally. “Our short- and long-term goals are the same: to give deserving students the best academic collegiate experience every day so they can complete their degree and fulfill their future,” Cynthia explains.


In 2014, CSU was designated an 1890 Land-Grant University,


charged with impacting critical teaching and learning, conducting research, and providing extension services to local farmers and neighboring Ohio counties. Since this designation, the College of Education’s School of Agricultural Education and Food Science was named Post-Secondary Program of 2018 by the Ohio Association of Agricultural Educators.


“While the forecast for growth is constantly changing, STEM and agriculture remain the driving factors of national growth and workforce demand, meaning they hold the greatest prospects for


career advancement,”


Cynthia explains. “We are a small university located in a very small community, so commanding a presence on the higher education stage alongside larger, more well- known institutions will always be a hurdle for us. Nevertheless, it is our mission to make higher education available to everyone who wants it.”


To provide new research opportunities for the growing number of agriculture students, in 2017 CSU


Quality leadership is the same regardless of race and gender.”


the construction of its new Demonstration and Agricultural Experiment Station, which includes an aquaponics facility and agricultural research buildings. Also underway is a new botanical garden where faculty, staff, students and the community can grow fruits and vegetables.


Catering to its flourishing student population, last year CSU broke ground on a new 250-bed apartment-style residential hall to provide students with one-, two-, and four-bedroom housing options. As CSU’s largest on- campus residence hall, the $24 million complex will also house a state-of-the-art Wellness Center and provide hands-on space for the university’s Exercise Science academic program.


In Summer 2018, Cynthia was named to the national board of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, the nation’s largest organization exclusively representing public HBCUs – of which CSU is a member-school.


“We must remember that quality leadership is the same regardless of race and gender.


I would


advise aspiring female leaders not to use gender as a crutch because we don’t need it. We are capable, we don’t judge ourselves against another gender or our counterparts, and we do what is necessary to be successful for our universities.”


commenced


This article originally ran in The CEO Magazine Education/North America in March 2019. Holly Johnson, Danielle Ervin, photographer.


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