Cottey Inaugural events to take place April 8-9

Nevada Daily Mail

For the first time in almost 19 years, Cottey College will be conducting a presidential inauguration. A series of special events will occur throughout the weekend of April 8-9 to commemorate the historic occasion as Judy Robinson Rogers, PhD, is officially installed as the 11th president of the college. The following two events are open to the public.

On Friday, April 8, Peggy Miller, EdD, president of South Dakota State University, will deliver a keynote address at 8 p.m., in the auditorium of the Haidee and Allen wild Center for the Arts. A reception will follow.

Miller was a senior fellow and acting vice president for Academic and International Programs at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities in Washington, D.C., prior to her appointment as president as SDSU. Miller has extensive higher education leadership experience; first at Indiana University Northwest, where she was chancellor from 1983 to 1992; and then at the University of Akron, where she served as president from 1992 to 1996. Miller has served on a broad range of state and national higher education boards and commissions.

She holds honorary degrees from Transylvania University and Chungnam National University in Korea. She is listed in "Who's Who in America," the "World's Who's Who of Women," and was named a Distinguished Alumna of Northwestern University. Miller holds degrees from Indiana University, Northwestern University and Transylvania University.

On Saturday, April 9, the Inaugural Ceremony will begin at 10 a.m., inside the auditorium.

Bryan Breckenridge, member of the Cottey College Board of Trustees and the chair of the presidential search committee; W. Joyce Goff, president of International chapter of the PEO Sisterhood; and Helen Kirby, chair of the Cottey College Board of Trustees, are among the dignitaries who will be involved in the platform party.

The ceremony will feature representatives from organizations and learned societies offering their greetings to Rogers.

There will also be music from the Cottey Chamber Singers and a piano and violin duo from Kentucky.

The Kansas City Brass will provide both the processional and recessional.

Following her investiture by the board of trustees and the PEO Sisterhood, Rogers will outline her vision for the college in her address.

A Native of Shelbyville, Ky., Rogers has a BA in English and speech and theatre from Centre College of Kentucky and the MA and PhD in English from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill which she attended as a Woodrow WIlson Fellow.

Rogers' experience in leadership education includes a year-long appointment as an American Council on Education Fellow, a program designed to teach leadership for higher education. She is a long-time member of Phi Kappa Phi, Omicron Delta Kappa, and Delta Kappa Gamma honorary societies.