Shorter president receives HBCU award
Shorter College President Jerome Green has been named one of the Ten Most Dominant HBCU Leaders Award and Class of 2024 by the HBCU Campaign Fund, the organization said Wednesday.
The list is an annual national recognition created by the Campaign Fund, a nonprofit that advocates for historically Black colleges and universities, commonly known as HBCUs and Minority-Serving Institutions, and tries to help raise funds for scholarships and programs for them.
Others on this year’s list of chancellors and presidents are Ronald Mason Jr. (University of the District of Columbia), Clarence D. Armbrister (Johnson C. Smith University), Patricia Ramsey (Medgar Evers College), Fred Jones Jr. (Southern Heritage Classic), Larry Robinson (Florida A&M University), David A. Thomas (Morehouse College), Javaune Adams-Gaston (Norfolk State University), Ernest McNealey (Allen University), and David Hall (University of the Virgin Islands).
Demetrius Johnson Jr., president, chief executive officer and founder of the HBCU Campaign Fund, said the fourth selected group of leaders have “proven their responsibilities for shaping policies, changing perspectives, and making decisions that affect millions of individuals in the higher education space, and the daily needs of what an HBCU or Minority-Serving Institutions contributes.”
Green is an ordained itinerant elder in the African American Methodist Church and a licensed attorney who has served as the president of Shorter College since 2012.
Shorter College is a private, faith-based, two-year liberal arts college in North Little Rock.
The organization cited as Green’s accomplishments the full reaccreditation by the Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools and recertification by the Arkansas Higher Education Coordinating Board of Higher Education; enrollment increases, with the latest numbers from the Arkansas Division of Higher Education showing 755 students, a 19.5% increase from fall 2022 and a 32.9% increase from 2019; campus beautification projects; the return of intercollegiate sports; and the construction on the first three dormitories to house noncommuter students.
The organization also cited the college’s recent announcement about its efforts to develop a technology hub with a $1.2 million grant from the Federal Economic Development Agency.