Tryan McMickens
Dr. Tryan L. McMickens serves as a full professor of higher education and interim associate dean of the School of Education at North Carolina Central University (NCCU). NCCU is an exceptional Historically Black College and University (HBCU) with an innovative higher education graduate program. Located in the Research Triangle, NCCU is the first public liberal arts institution for Black Americans in the United States, and it is one of 17 campuses that constitute the University of North Carolina System.
For the past decade, he was on the faculty of Suffolk University in Boston, Massachusetts, as an associate professor of higher education, the third director of the Administration of Higher Education Program, and the inaugural director of the Disability Services in Higher Education Certificate Program. He is the former director of operations and strategic initiatives, ad interim, at the University of Richmond's School of Arts and Sciences (A&S), its largest school comprised of 23 departments and 11 interdisciplinary programs. He was responsible for helping to design and execute various aspects of C30, A&S's first strategic plan.
Prior to joining the faculty at Suffolk, he spent four years as an assistant director of the National Black Male College Achievement Study, the nation's largest study of Black men in higher education. He also served as assistant director of the Grad Prep Academy and doctoral research assistant to Dr. Shaun R. Harper in the Center for the Study of Race and Equity in Education at the University of Pennsylvania. Before Penn, he served in various project management, student affairs, development, and fundraising roles at Harvard Medical School, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Tuskegee University, and the Thurgood Marshall College Fund.
Dr. McMickens's funded research portfolio exceeds half a million dollars, and he was awarded over $200,000 in fellowship awards from the Bill and Melinda Gates Millennium Scholars Program. His research centers on historically marginalized and underserved populations that suffer from inequities, particularly in higher education, and how these populations can live full and prosperous lives in and beyond higher education. Equity and liberation are central to much of his scholarship. His work applies qualitative methods, and he has extensive experience using the various traditions in qualitative research. In 2013, the University of Pennsylvania awarded him the Early Career/Alumni Award of Merit.
Dr. McMickens teaches on Historically Black Colleges and Universities, financial aspects of higher education, student development theory and practice, and diversity issues in higher education; he also teaches practicum. He is a consultant for a diverse assemblage of organizations, including non-profits, colleges, and universities on good practices in strategic planning and implementation; equity and liberation; student success; alumni engagement; and resource development, particularly stewardship and fundraising.
Several organizations have praised his research, leadership, and teaching, including the American College Personnel Association (ACPA, 2025 Diamond Honoree; 2024 Annuit Coeptis Senior Professional Award); the American Association of University Administrators (AAUA, 2024 John Blackburn Exemplary Higher Education Model Award); the American Educational Research Association (AERA, 2012 Division J Finalist for Dissertation of the Year Award); Phi Delta Kappa International (2012 Emerging Leader; 2011 Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award); NASPA: Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education (2026 Bob E. Leach Award for Outstanding Service to Students; 2023 African American Knowledge Community Stellar 50; 2023 Outstanding Contribution to Student Affairs Through Teaching in Region III; 2022 Outstanding Historically Black College and University/Minority Serving Institution Professional in Region III; 2012 Network for Educational Equity and Ethnic Diversity Award in Region I; 2011 Melvene D. Hardee Runner Up Dissertation of the Year Award); North Carolina Central University (2026 Soaring Eagle Award; 2025 Inaugural Award for Excellence in Online Teaching for Graduate Programs; 2024 Award for Excellence in Teaching); and Suffolk University (2020 College of Arts and Sciences Racial Equity Champion Faculty Award; 2016 Dean John Brennan Award for Outstanding Graduate Instruction). He has been featured or quoted in Education Week, the Chronicle of Higher Education, U.S. News and World Report, and other media outlets. Diverse Issues in Higher Education featured him in their August 2024 HBCUs in North Carolina volume.
Dr. McMickens sailed around the world and developed cross-cultural and global exposure in Brazil, Cambodia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Kenya, India, South Africa, Tanzania, Thailand, Venezuela, and Vietnam with the Semester at Sea program. He earned bachelor’s degrees in sales and marketing and business administration from Tuskegee University. He obtained a master’s degree in administration of higher education from Suffolk University. He holds an educational doctorate in higher education from the University of Pennsylvania.