University of Maryland Eastern Shore President Juliette Bell today announced her plans to resign, effective June 30.
In a letter to the campus community, Dr. Bell shared her thanks with the campus which in the last five years has risen to prominence as a producer of black pharmacy graduates, and obtained Doctoral University status from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education by Indiana University Center for Postsecondary Research.
“I believe there is a time and a season for all things,” she wrote. “This is my time to renew, to rekindle my passions, and to spend quality time with family, especially my M&Ms (a.k.a my five grandkids).”
Dr. Bell cited new academic programs, including the university’s first fully online degree and master’s in cyber-security engineering technology as institutional successes, along with increased graduation rates and capital improvements exceeding $100 million in her six-year tenure.
Dr. Bell, the immediate past chair of the Association of Public & Land Grant Universities’ Council of 1890 Universities, announces her resignation plans less than a week after federal lawmakers proposed a bill which would allow historically black land-grant universities to carry over more than 20 percent of federal funds awarded in support of agriculture programs from one fiscal year to the next, but does not set standards for future appropriations thresholds or matching requirements from states.
