An immersive program to prepare tomorrow’s top academic leaders
The Western Academic Leadership Academy (Academy), launched in 2015, is a year-long professional development program for academic leaders aspiring to become chief academic officers in the WICHE region’s postsecondary four-year sector. The Academy, sponsored by the Western Academic Leadership Forum (Forum), seeks to encourage the talents of the next generation of Western provosts by helping to build the knowledge and skills of academic leaders who are poised to move to that level.
The Academy’s faculty members share their expertise on the unique roles and responsibilities a provost assumes at a four-year institution and system. They focus specifically on developing practical skills within academic affairs, fiscal affairs, student affairs, and external relationships, with a special sensitivity to the culture and environment of the West’s higher education community.
The summer seminar is followed by opportunities for cohort members to meet with a faculty mentor as well as their cohort colleagues at national meetings or electronically throughout the year for individual consultation about career paths. The Academy’s program culminates in a session at the Western Academic Leadership Forum annual meeting the following spring.
Director of Academic Leadership Initiatives, Programs and Services