The College of William and Mary will face numerous changes this upcoming academic year, particularly in the structuring of the College administration.
In a June email to the College Student Affairs Division, Senior Vice President for Student Affairs and Public Safety Virginia Ambler ’88, Ph.D. ’06 announced that she would not refill the position of dean of students, which was previously held by Stacey Harris. Harris came to the College in the spring of 2022. Ambler later announced these changes to the wider student body in an email Tuesday, Aug. 20.
“Instead, I am taking the opportunity to strategically re-align the existing Student Success staff and units, and simultaneously build upon existing senior leadership in the division,” Ambler wrote to the Student Affairs division. “With one less administrative layer, the new [organizational] structure will bring me closer to the current student success team, and it will distribute the workload more equitably across the division.”
The new structure includes the removal of the dean of students position and the addition of three new positions below the vice president level. Wilmarie Rodríguez Ed.D. ’21 will serve as assistant vice president for Student Success, Greg Henderson will be associate vice president and chief of staff, while Anna Mroch will be assistant vice president for Planning and Strategy and director of assessment.
The roles of Associate Vice President for Health and Wellness Kelly Crace and Associate Vice President of Student Engagement and Leadership Michael Patterson will be at the same level as those three new positions.
According to Suzanne Clavet, the College of William and Mary’s director of Media Relations, while the structure of student affairs will be new, student services will remain intact.
The changes were announced after the departure of Harris, who was slated to become the new associate vice president of student affairs and dean of students at Duke University. However, her employment at Duke was halted before it was scheduled to start. It is not clear why she did not assume this role.
After leaving, Harris made public statements on Instagram detailing structural and professional problems at the College. She also said some individuals at the College reached out to Duke to discuss personnel issues surrounding her.
“My friends, from what I have heard there will no longer be a Dean of Students for you at all,” Harris wrote in an Instagram post on an account that was later made private. “How does this support students? I have no idea. But I believe you have a right to know about major changes that affect you, including where to go to get support and care, to seek guidance in having issues resolved, to find belonging. There are many amazing staff who can help you, they just may be harder to find.”
Harris’s posts have been met with support from many students.
Former member of Harris’s Dean of Students’s Council Atticus Gore ’26 said he was able to have close personal and professional relationships with her as a student. While he was initially excited for Harris’ position offer at Duke, he expressed dismay at Harris’s departure, particularly that she did not feel that she belonged at the College.
“If we are going to be saying ‘who comes here belongs here’, we need to be doing that from the president all the way down throughout our campus to to anyone who ever steps onto our campus and in whatever capacity they have,” Gore said.
Gore said he and his fellow colleagues on the Dean of Students’s Council drafted a plan for the restructuring of the council itself, which he has presented to Ambler and hoped to discuss in more detail with the vice president. While he said he does not intend to tell professional educators and administrators how to run the College, he believes that student advocacy is important and hopes to work with the person who fills Harris’ vacancy.
So far, the new AVPs expect a successful outcome out of the new restructuring plan.
“Students have access to the same services and support previously available,” Mroch, who oversees planning and strategy, wrote in an email to The Flat Hat. “Our dedication to helping all students to seamlessly integrate into the campus community and make the most of all W&M has to offer remains steadfast. We are excited to explore the benefits of how this organizational change can help us enhance the ways we build relationships across campus, carefully design programming, and use data to inform our work.”
She also commented on the new title change, particularly the departure of “dean” and other similar titles, such as associate dean.
“The title changes are now more aligned across the Student Affairs Division,” Mroch wrote. “This consistency will allow students to better navigate our departments and services.”
Rodriguez, who now oversees Student Success, also gave her thoughts on the new arrangements.
“This is a very exciting time for me and the entire Student Success team,” she wrote in an email to The Flat Hat. “We are enthusiastic about the changes and opportunities the shifts in our structure will allow, and we are especially eager for the chance to better communicate our services and supportive framework to our campus community.”
Rodriguez previously served as senior associate dean of students and executive director of Student Success.
“In that sense, the organizational changes should be seamless for students,” Rodriguez added. “What has changed is our ability as advocates and mentors to address student needs even more effectively through enhanced collaboration across Student Success departments and with our many campus partners.”
She also noted that students will still be able to come to any unit in Student Success to receive guidance and assistance in addressing their needs and questions.
Director of The Haven and Senior Director of Gender-Based Violence Resources and Advocacy Services Liz Cascone, whose division lies within Student Affairs, said students should not expect any changes in the services provided by The Haven.
“Students still have access to the same confidential resources and information as they did prior to the new organizational structure. The Haven, and a new unit called Adaptable Resolution Initiatives, will now be under Gender-Based Violence Resources & Advocacy Services (led by myself) within a new area in Student Affairs called Community Values & Connection,” Cascone wrote in an email to The Flat Hat.
Ambler also announced that the Center for Student Diversity and the Office of First Generation Student Engagement are now part of the newly created Planning, Strategy, & Integrative Practices thematic area, headed by Mroch. The CSD, specifically, will be under the leadership of interim Director Monique Williams.
The new plan comes after a slew of administrative changes. Apart from Harris’s departure, it also followed the end of Jeremy P. Martin Ph.D. ’12, M.B.A. ’17’s tenure as the College’s vice president for Strategy and Innovation, as well as the appointment of Michael J. Todd, who will serve as the new executive vice president for Finance and Administration. Martin is heading to Florida Southern College to serve as its president.
Patterson, a new AVP in Student Affairs, is also a new hire. He previously served as assistant vice president for student affairs at State University of New York at New Paltz.
This is a developing story.
CORRECTION (08/30/24): Article was updated by the Standards and Practices Editor to remove duplicate sentence.
CORRECTION (11/18/24): Article was updated by the Standards and Practices Editor to clarify the nature of Harris’s position at Duke University.
