In 1982, Dr. Regina Dixon-Reeves was just about to graduate with her bachelor's degree from Marquette University. As with most graduates, she had been fielding questions about what she intended to do after college.
She had no idea.
But one day, walking up a hill on campus at the corner of 21st Street and Wisconsin Avenue, it hit her like a lightning bolt.
“I want to be a college president,” Dixon-Reeves said.
Dr. Regina Dixon-Reeves
The brilliancy of the moment, the direction she suddenly felt, was paused by her next immediate thought: “I don’t even know how to do that. How does one do that?”
Thirty-five years later, Dixon-Reeves applied to join the first cohort of Rutgers University Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) Aspiring Leaders program, a two-year long course that brings the next generation of MSI presidents together with current or retired MSI presidents, creating a culture of familiarity, openness, and curiosity that has led to the program’s success.
