Dr. Marcus Collins is the Associate Provost for Academic and Community Engagement.
Dr Collins oversees the Academic and Community Engagement centers and programs which includes the N.C. Botanical Gardens, Morehead Planetarium and Science Center, Ackland Art Musuem, the Center for Public Service, the Women’s Center, the Asian American and American Indian and Latinx Centers, the Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Research in Black Culture and History, Carolina Seminars and the Carolina Higher Education Opportunity Programs (CHEOP). In this role, Dr Collins seeks to align the strategy and mission of the various units to support the university’s mission for research, engagement, and public service. In addition, he serves as the chair of the Centers and Institutes Review Committee which is responsible for the review of all campus centers and institutes. In addition, the committee reviews all requests for the establishment and abolishment of centers.
Dr Collins has over 25 years of higher education experience focused on student experience and student success across a wide spectrum of programs and services. He began his career at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke where he coordinated a program to encourage students to pursue advanced degrees in the science, mathematics, engineering, and technology disciplines. He credits this experience for being the spark to ignite his passion for higher education and the transformative power it has to change the trajectory of all students as it continues to do for him today.
Dr Collins has assumed various leadership roles over the years with increasing responsibility to include having most recently served as the Associate Dean for the Center for Student Success in the College of Arts and Sciences. He led the unit through a recent merger and realignment of student success programs in order to better serve the campus community of students, along with faculty and staff. As a result, this realignment provided an avenue for more robust philanthropic support to optimize outreach and service to all Carolina students.
A first-generation college student and a proud citizen of the Lumbee tribe of N.C., Dr Collins holds a doctorate in higher education administration from North Carolina State University, a master’s in public administration, and a B.S. in biology from the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.