Perez hired as Chico State president; Sac State names a new top administrator

“Dr. Perez’s progressive leadership experience and steadfast dedication to inclusive excellence and student success make him the right person to continue, indeed amplify, Chico State’s strong legacy.”

Stephen Perez, who was hired as interim provost and vice president of Academic Affairs at Chico State earlier this year, now has a permanent position at the university: president.

The California State University Board of

Trustees announced Wednesday morning that Perez will serve as its 13th president. He will succeed Gayle Hutchinson, who is retiring at the end of

June. Perez will assume the university presidency July 1.

“I consider it an honor and a privilege to be selected to lead Chico

State,” said Perez. “In my time at the University, I have been taken by the ‘Chico Experience’ — a palpable climate of caring and belonging, as well as a deep respect for culture and the natural environment. Chico State is the North State’s educational center, and I will work energetically to strengthen partnerships across the University and region that will allow us to reach new heights as a studentcentered, college-town institution that changes lives and connects us all.”

“Dr. Perez’s progressive leadership experience and steadfast dedication to inclusive excellence and student success make him the right person to continue, indeed amplify, Chico State’s strong legacy,” said CSU Trustee Lillian Kimbell, chair of the Chico State Presidential Search Committee. “He has a proven track record of strong fiscal management, community building and advocacy for faculty and students.”

Perez has spent most of his 30-year career in higher education with the CSU system. For 20 years, he served in academic and administrative roles at Sacramento State, including professor, department chair, interim dean, vice provost and provost. As provost, he led efforts to increase Sac State’s four-year graduate rates from 9 percent to more than 25 percent while working to eliminate equity gaps.

In January 2022, Perez was appointed interim president at San José

State. In that role, he led the implementation of strategies to close equity gaps and increase enrollment, worked to strengthen a culture of care on campus, build community relationships, and fortify the university’s reputation for academic excellence.

As that role concluded, he accepted his current position at Chico State. Since January, he has led the Enrollment Continuum effort to focus on growing enrollment and helped close a $20 million budget gap.

Perez became interim provost in January following the resignation of Debra Larson on Dec.

16, 2022 — eight days after the first Edsource story by Thomas Peele appeared in this newspaper about the alleged threats made by biology professor David Stachura against coworkers who cooperated in a Title IX investigation. The university originally announced Larson was resigning effective immediately, although she ended up staying on in an “advisory” role through the end of this month, meaning the university has been paying two provost salaries.

Previously, Perez also held faculty positions at Virginia Commonwealth University and Washington State University. He holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of California,

San Diego, and a master’s and doctorate in economics

California State University Trustee Lillian Kimbell

from UC Davis.

Sacramento State announces next university president

Sacramento State has named its next president, set to take the helm as the university’s top administrator this summer.

California State University trustees on Wednesday appointed J. Luke Wood, an alumnus of Sacramento State and a Northern California native, to become the university’s ninth president, campus officials announced in a news release.

Wood, 41, will assume the role July 16 following the retirement of the current president, Robert S. Nelsen, who has served in that position since 2015.

“It’s about investing back in the community that invested in me,” Wood said in a prepared statement.

“I know what Sac State is capable of doing. I was a Black male, former foster child, first-generation college student who struggled with food insecurity and housing insecurity, and was able to graduate because of the incredible people and systems of support that were in place.”

Wood currently serves as vice president for student affairs and campus diversity at San Diego State University, where he is also chief diversity officer.

Born in Oakland and raised in Siskiyou County, Wood earned a bachelor’s degree in Black history and politics as well as a master’s degree in higher education at Sacramento State, the university said.

He then moved to Arizona State University, where he received another master’s degree, in curriculum and instruction in early childhood education, as well as a doctorate in educational leadership and policy studies, Sacramento State officials said.

He met his wife, Idara Essien, now a San Diego State professor of child and family development, while both were students at Sacramento State, according to the news release.

In 2017, Wood became San Diego State’s first

Black faculty member to be named a distinguished professor. He joined the university as a professor in 2011.

Wood has authored 16 books and published research focusing on

“racial inequality issues in education, particularly community colleges,” Sacramento State officials wrote.

Wood in 2020 coauthored a report finding that Black students at Sacramento City Unified School District were suspended and expelled at disproportionate rates compared to other students.

Nelsen last November announced his intent to retire at the end of the current academic year.

Nelsen over his final Sacramento State commencement ceremony over the weekend, at

Golden 1 Center. A recordsetting 9,574 students graduated in 2023.

The Sacramento Bee contributed to this report.