Former YSU provost takes helm at Norfolk State

Staff report

norfolk, va.

Tony Atwater, former president of Indiana University of Pennsylvania and current Senior Fellow, American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU), has been chosen to lead Norfolk State University as its fifth permanent president, the NSU Board of Visitors announced.

His appointment is effective July 1. Atwater’s record as a president, senior administrator and teacher/scholar is a match for the presidential profile developed in conjunction with the larger NSU community.

Atwater, a Youngstown resident and former provost and vice president for academic affairs at Youngstown State University, has been charged by the NSU Board of Visitors to lead the operations, growth and visionary planning for the university.

Atwater, who guided IUP to a host of accomplishments — academically, financially and through increased enrollment — brings 20 years of experience as a senior administrator.

He increased enrollment, while significantly increasing fundraising and capital construction. He also diversified the student body, while increasing the percentage of faculty with terminal degrees and extending its record of being nationally recognized in US News and World Report and the Princeton Review.

“I pledge my best efforts to work collaboratively with all sectors of the university to advance NSU to the next level of academic excellence and national distinction,” Atwater said. He also told board members, “I look forward to serving the students, the faculty, staff and administrators of this excellent university.”

Atwater has a doctorate in communication from Michigan State University. He subsequently completed post-doctoral studies in the Department of Communication at the University of Michigan, has a bachelor’s degree in Mass Media Arts from Hampton University and completed coursework toward a Master of Arts in Education at Virginia Tech.

Atwater, 59, has had previous administrative positions, including dean of the College of Professional Studies and Education at Northern Kentucky University, associate vice president for Academic Affairs at the University of Toledo and Chairman of the Department of Journalism and Mass Media at Rutgers University (New Brunswick, N.J).

Prior to his teaching and administrative career in higher education, he worked as a broadcast journalist on television and at radio stations in Roanoke and Lynchburg, Va.

Atwater, a native of Nashville, Tenn., is married to Dr. Beverly Roberts-Atwater, a native of Jacksonville, Fla.

Dr. Roberts-Atwater serves as the medical director of Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital in Warren. She will join Atwater in Norfolk.