Sam Kirkpatrick
Executive Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Management
Samuel A. Kirkpatrick is Executive Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Management, and Executive Professor at the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University. Immediately prior to rejoining Texas A&M, he was a Senior Fellow at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities in Washington, D.C., where he advised university presidents, and engaged in public university projects relevant to the metropolitan mission, public engagement, civic education, and cultural and economic development outreach. He is also a Senior Fellow at Strategic Initiatives, Inc., where he provides consultative services in strategic planning, continuous quality improvement, change management and technology innovations for nonprofit organizations. In addition, he serves as an advisor/Senior Executive to boards in the areas of fundraising and strategic planning and as an independent management consultant. His expertise draws on an academic background in public and nonprofit management, organizational dynamics, quality assurance, strategic planning, public policy and information technology applications, plus successful leadership experience as a university president on two occasions, academic dean and department chair, public affairs/public policy center director and statewide honors program director.
Dr. Kirkpatrick has served as the president of two public, comprehensive, metropolitan universities that offer programs in the arts, sciences, and professions to more than 25,000 degree students and large numbers of non-degree students served by over 2500 faculty and staff. As metropolitan universities, both the University of Texas at San Antonio and Eastern Michigan University focus on programs that are tailored to the diverse needs of metropolitan students, including leadership development, on public service, regional stewardship and cultural outreach, on both research-based knowledge and practical application and experience, and on education for effective citizenship.
During his Texas presidency, the university developed more than 30 new academic programs, including its first doctoral degree programs, and five new interdisciplinary research centers; more than doubled its institutional budget; built a successful fundraising operation and conducted a capital campaign; greatly expanded student programs and residential life; nearly doubled its facilities, including a new downtown branch campus; and won national recognition for innovations in information technology and improvements in student recruitment, retention and success. He also developed extensive community collaboratives in public education, service learning, nonprofit management, public policy, volunteerism, economic development, business assistance and the arts. During his tenure, the university received the nation's highest management achievement award in higher education from the National Association of College and University Business Officers.
During President Kirkpatrick's leadership in Michigan, he developed and implemented a set of comprehensive strategic plans that further enhanced the university's recognized strength in undergraduate education; established new graduate programs, including the first Ph.D. program, and outreach centers that reflect the synergy of theory and practice and are responsive to regional needs; built model programs in public and civic engagement that address needs of communities and nonprofit organizations; and ensured the continuous improvement of the institution through academic program review, accreditation activities, heightened fundraising, expanded extramural research, special federal appropriations, information and communications technology improvements, support for human resources and professional development, streamlined administrative practices, enhanced facilities, and ongoing strategic planning and assessment.
In addition to his most recent responsibilities in the nation's capital, Dr. Kirkpatrick was previously a senior fellow with the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, having served on its board of directors on two occasions. As a senior fellow, he chaired a project to develop and implement an action agenda for American higher education to advise presidents and chancellors in the areas of quality assurance, public engagement, access and inclusion, and communication and advocacy. He also served as a learning group mentor on information technology for the American Council on Education's Fellows Program.
Dr. Kirkpatrick also has had tenured senior faculty appointments at the above universities and at the University of Oklahoma, where he directed the Bureau of Government Research, a public policy research center, and the Scholar Leadership Enrichment Program, a statewide honors program for 21 public and private colleges and universities; at Texas A&M University, where he chaired the Department of Political Science; and at Arizona State University, where he served as dean of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.
Active in civic organizations, foundations, and other nonprofit entities, his service includes a wide array of governing boards in research, fundraising, cultural activities, technology, human services, city planning, minority affairs, economic development, international affairs, and civic and school reform. These include the Texas Research and Technology Foundation, United Way (Valley of the Sun, Bexar and Washtenaw counties), the Texas Research Park, San Antonio Downtown Planning Commission, Pan American Roundtable, San Antonio Education Partnership, the Washtenaw Development Council, the Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce, Martin Luther King Commission, San Antonio World Trade Association, San Antonio Medical Foundation, Texas Innovation Network System, Citizens Research Council of Michigan, World Affairs Council, Orme School, Southwest Research Institute, and the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research.
Dr. Kirkpatrick has held leadership positions in higher education associations, including the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools; the Commission on the Urban Agenda for the National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges (NASULGC); and the American Council on Education's Commission on Governmental Relations and its Commission on Women, among others. He has had leadership and governance responsibilities for the Southwest Research Consortium, Texas International Education Consortium, the Association of Texas Colleges and Universities, the Higher Education Council of San Antonio and the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research. In addition, he served on the Blue Ribbon (Legislative) Panel on the Civic Good of Higher Education (Michigan), the Board of Governors of the NSF Alliance for Minority Participation, the U.S. Air Force Advisory Board for Minority Institutions, the Base Adjustment Strategy Committee, the Executive Advisory Council of Systems and Computer Technology Corporation, and as an advisor/consultant to the College Board, NBC and ABC News, NSF, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, Department of Justice, NEH, and the U.S. Senate.
He played a leadership role in establishing and expanding the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities to encompass more than 75 institutional members and recently served as Secretary-Treasurer and administrator for the Coalition, on the Board of Directors of NASULGC, and the Professional Development Committee of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities. For much of the last decade he has also served on the Board of Directors of American Humanics, the national corporation responsible for nonprofit management education programs on college campuses.
Active in his teaching and research fields of political science, public administration and nonprofit management, he has served on the executive council of the American Political Science Association; as president of the Southwestern Political Science Association and the Southwestern Social Science Association; as editor of American Politics Quarterly; and as an editorial board member for Metropolitan Universities, American Journal of Political Science, Political Behavior and Social Science Quarterly. In addition, he has been principal or co-principal investigator on research and program development grants from the Ford Foundation, U.S. Civil Service Commission, NSF, Kerr Foundation, AT&T Foundation, NIH, AID, and the National Strategy Information Center, among others.
Dr. Kirkpatrick received a Ph.D. and M.A. in political science from The Pennsylvania State University and a bachelor's degree and honorary doctorate in public service from Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania. He is the author of six books, more than 75 articles, chapters, monographs and professional papers, and more than 100 executive papers and keynote addresses. Special areas of interest include public policy, strategic planning, nonprofit cultural and arts management, continuous improvement and assessment, information and communications technology, fundraising, human resource and professional development strategies, and organizational change management.
