Sampson County native Susan C. Faircloth has been named the new director of Colorado State University’s School of Education. Faircloth, an enrolled member of the Coharie Tribe, joins CSU from the University of North Carolina Wilmington, where she is a professor in the Department of Educational Leadership.

Faircloth has a diverse set of research interests, which include Indigenous education, the education of culturally and linguistically diverse students with special educational needs, and the moral and ethical dimensions of school leadership.

‘Eminent scholar’

“I am thrilled that eminent scholar and leader Dr. Susan Faircloth will be joining CSU as director of the School of Education,” said Jeff McCubbin, dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences.

“My family and I are extremely excited to join the Colorado State University community,” said Faircloth. “What attracted me most to this university and the surrounding community was the opportunity not only to live out my academic life in a supportive, energetic, and intellectually stimulating environment, but also the opportunity for my family and me to live in an area that offers a variety of educational, cultural, and recreational options that allow us to become enmeshed within the local community.”

Attracted to land-grant mission

Faircloth was also attracted to CSU because it is one of the nation’s original land-grant institutions.

“Both my master’s and doctoral degrees were earned at a land-grant institution, The Pennsylvania State University,” she said. “I hold dear the land-grant mission of serving the people and communities of this land and ensuring equitable educational opportunities and access for all.”

Faircloth has published extensively on various topics within American Indian and Indigenous education, examining identity, social justice, culture, poverty, and leadership, among other issues.

“As an American Indian and scholar of Indigenous education, my career has been marked by both a personal and professional commitment to issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion,” she said. “I view CSU as a great place in which to continue and expand this work while supporting faculty, staff, and students in pursuing their own individual and collective goals and aspirations as they relate to education.”

Widely published

Faircloth’s scholarship appears widely in journals such as Educational Administration Quarterly, Harvard Educational Review, The Journal of Special Education Leadership, International Studies in Educational Administration, Values and Ethics in Educational Administration, Tribal College Journal of American Indian Higher Education, Rural Special Education Quarterly, and Journal of Disability Policy Studies. She is currently co-editing a book entitled: On Indian ground: The South – A return to Indigenous knowledge – Generating hope, leadership, and sovereignty through education.

Faircloth is also actively involved in service-related activities. She serves as senior associate editor of the American Journal of Education and member of the editorial board of the Journal of American Indian Education.

Service to Indian education

Beyond her editorial service, Faircloth serves on a number of panels and boards. She is a member of the Bureau of Indian Education’s Special Education Advisory Board, vice chair of the North Carolina State Advisory Council on Indian Education, and chair of the technical review panel for the National Indian Education Study conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics, the Office of Indian Education, and the Educational Testing Service.

Prior to joining the faculty of University of North Carolina Wilmington, Faircloth was an associate professor in the Department of Leadership, Policy, and Adult and Higher Education at North Carolina State University and an associate professor and director of the American Indian Leadership Program at Penn State.

Faircloth is a former Fulbright Senior Scholar to New Zealand, Ford Foundation Postdoctoral scholar with the Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles at the University of California Los Angeles, Fellow with the American Indian/Alaska Native Head Start Research Center at the University of Colorado, and a William C. Friday Fellow for Human Relations.

Faircloth’s tentative start date is July 15.

“As we welcome Dr. Faircloth to the CSU community, I’d also like to recognize the incredibly valuable contributions that have been made to the school by outgoing co-directors Gene Gloeckner and Louise Jennings,” McCubbin said. “Their leadership has provided a strong foundation on which to build.”

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By Gretchen Gerding