(SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – July 7, 2015) SUNY Empire State College President Merodie A. Hancock today announced the appointment of Clayton A. Steen as vice president of enrollment management, following a national search. Steen will join the college Sept. 1.

Steen has more than 18 years of experience in higher education and currently serves as assistant vice president for enrollment management at Bowie State University, Bowie, Md., one of 12 institutions in the University System of Maryland.

Steen’s accomplishments at Bowie State include forging relationships with faculty, student support and service professionals across offices and departments and implementing proven enrollment strategies, focusing on key performance indicators. Enrollment has increased nearly five percent since Steen joined Bowie State in 2013, the highest level of enrollment in the university’s 150-year history.

“I am delighted to welcome Clayton Steen to the SUNY Empire State College community,” said Hancock. “The higher-education marketplace for nontraditional students is changing and becoming far more competitive every day. By working collaboratively across departments, Clayton has successfully met and overcome many of the same challenges SUNY Empire faces today. In addition to his significant professional accomplishments, Clayton has experience working with adult and nontraditional students, which makes him the ideal choice for this critical leadership role. I am confident Clayton will be a great asset for our students, faculty and staff.”

“Joining the SUNY Empire State College team is an exciting challenge and a wonderful opportunity,” said Steen. “A strong enrollment manager understands and values the interconnectedness of the entire institution in recruiting, enrolling, retaining, graduating, employing and engaging an increasingly diverse student body as alumni. I am grateful for the support of President Hancock and the college’s search committee.”

As vice president, Steen will provide vision and strategic direction for SUNY Empire’s marketing, recruitment and retention programs and initiatives.

He also will be responsible for developing, implementing and overseeing strategic and multidimensional marketing, recruitment and retention strategies for nontraditional undergraduate and graduate students.

He will report directly to the president and will be a member of her leadership cabinet.

Steen succeeds Mitchell Nesler, vice president for enrollment management and decision support, who had taken on responsibility for enrollment management and marketing on an interim basis in 2012.

He will continue to oversee the college’s institutional research and strategic planning efforts as a vice president and member of the president's cabinet.

About Clayton A. Steen

A native of Rochester, N.Y., Steen, 45, holds two SUNY degrees, a doctorate in culture, policy and society, and a Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences, both from The State University of New York at Buffalo. He earned a master’s in education from Medaille College, Buffalo, N.Y. He earned a master’s in education from Medaille College, Buffalo, N.Y.

Steen was the senior manager for enrollment performance management for the U.S. and international campuses at Laureate Education, Inc., and was director of Stevenson University’s School of Graduate and Professional Studies. At D’Youville College, Buffalo, he was director of both the MBA program and ADVANCE, an accelerated adult degree completion program.

In addition, he has taught courses online, face-to-face and through a blend of both modes of study, at D’Youville and Medaille.

Steen has made presentations at numerous national conferences. Most recently, he presented “How Student Leadership and Community Engagement Create Positive Change and Active Citizenship” at the National Black Graduate Student Association Annual Conference, Cheyney University of Pennsylvania, in December 2014.

Steen participated in Hampton University’s Executive Leadership Summit, a program designed to strengthen the skill sets of those seeking to be executives and leaders.

At Bowie State, he has served as an advisor and member of both The National Society of Leadership and Success and Alpha Kappa Mu National Honor Society.

Steen is affiliated with the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators and is an active member of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc.

Apart from his professional life, Steen coaches youth sports at local recreation leagues and, with his wife of 13 years, Nakia, is the parent of sons Kenneth and Brayden, and daughters, Alexandria and Shakara.

About SUNY Empire State College

Empire State College, the nontraditional, open college of the SUNY system, educates more than 20,000 students worldwide at eight international sites, more than 35 locations in the state of New York, online, as well as face to face and through a blend of both, at the associate, bachelor’s and master’s levels.

The average age of an undergraduate student at the college is 35 and graduate students’ average age is 40.

Most Empire State College students are working adults. Many are raising families and meeting civic commitments in the communities where they live, while studying part time.

In addition to awarding credit for prior college-level learning, the college pairs each undergraduate student with a faculty mentor who supports that student throughout his or her college career.

Working with their mentors, students design an individual degree program and engage in guided independent study and course work onsite, online or through a combination of both, which provides the flexibility for students to choose where, when and how to learn.

Students have the opportunity to enroll five times during the year.

The college’s 73,000 alumni are active in their communities as entrepreneurs, politicians, business professionals, artists, nonprofit agency employees, teachers, veterans and active military, union members and more.

The college was first established in 1971 by the SUNY Board of Trustees with the encouragement of the late Ernest L. Boyer, chancellor of the SUNY system from 1970 to 1977.

Boyer also served as United States commissioner of education during the administration of President Jimmy Carter and then as president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

More information about the college is available at www.esc.edu.

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Media contact: David Henahan, director of communications

518-587-2100, ext. 2918

David.Henahan@esc.edu

518-321-7038 (after hours and on weekends)