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MC President Bryan Coker selected for Leadership Tennessee

June 15, 2022

Photo of Bryan Coker

Maryville College President Dr. Bryan F. Coker has been selected for participation in Leadership Tennessee’s Signature Program.

Entering its ninth year, Leadership Tennessee selects a new class of proven leaders annually to take part in statewide study while visiting different areas of Tennessee, learning best practices and analyzing important issues faced by Tennesseans. This 10-month, five-session study of those issues will result in increased statewide networking, collaborative conversation and concrete plans to continue that dialogue and actions beyond the yearlong commitment. 

Coker is one of 45 leaders from rural and urban communities across Tennessee selected for the Class IX cohort that will spend the next year engaging in collaborative, non-partisan dialogue on issues of statewide importance. Each of Tennessee’s three Grand Divisions are represented in the cohort, and members also reflect a diversity of professional roles. They will meet for the first time in August under the leadership of newly announced president and CEO Alfred Degrafinreid II.

“I’ve long considered Tennessee to be my adopted home state and am honored to represent Maryville College and Blount County in Leadership Tennessee,” Coker said. “I believe deeply in the people of Tennessee and want to do all I can to promote the brightest possible future for the Volunteer State.”

The anonymous selection committee, chaired this year by Class VII members Christy Gillenwater, president/CEO of the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce and Mike Keeney of Lewis Thomason in Memphis, built the class from over 300 nominations and 100 applications.

“Members of the College’s Board of Directors and I are very pleased to see President Coker selected for Leadership Tennessee,” said Maryville College Board Chairman Mike Davis. “We believe his participation will be tremendously beneficial to Maryville College as we strive to be more ‘of and for’ this region and of service to students from this state. We also believe President Coker’s knowledge, perspectives and experiences in higher education will enrich the important discussions surrounding Tennessee’s unique challenges and opportunities.”

Coker, Maryville College’s 12th president, assumed office on July 1, 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Maryville College Board of Directors recently unanimously approved a new five-year contract for Coker following a comprehensive review process that showed that the pandemic actually confirmed many of Coker’s greatest strengths as a leader.

The Board noted Maryville’s substantial progress in areas of focus that Coker identified soon after assuming the presidency: (1) embracing the College’s location and region; (2) becoming a more diverse, equitable and inclusive community; (3) capitalizing upon the liberal arts; and (4) “future-proofing” the College.

Coker and his wife, Sara, met as undergraduates at Rhodes College in Memphis, and both received graduate degrees from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Coker previously served as an administrator at UTK, prior to holding posts at colleges in Florida and Maryland.

About Leadership Tennessee

Leadership Tennessee was founded as an initiative of Lipscomb University’s College of Leadership and Public Service and launched as an independent 501c3 in August 2021. It fosters collaborative, non-partisan dialogue on issues of statewide importance by crossing geographic and professional boundaries and connecting a diverse network of problem solvers and engaged citizens.

Since 2013, Leadership Tennessee has developed a network of nearly 450 members, including its Signature Program and Leadership Tennessee NEXT program for emerging leaders, which announced its fifth cohort last week.

Maryville College is a nationally-ranked institution of higher learning and one of America’s oldest colleges. For more than 200 years we’ve educated students to be giving citizens and gifted leaders, to study everything, so that they are prepared for anything — to address any problem, engage with any audience and launch successful careers right away. Located in Maryville, Tennessee, between the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the city of Knoxville, Maryville College offers nearly 1,200  students from around the world both the beauty of a rural setting and the advantages of an urban center, as well as more than 60 majors, seven pre-professional programs and career preparation from their first day on campus to their last. Today, our 10,000 alumni are living life strong of mind and brave of heart and are prepared, in the words of our Presbyterian founder, to “do good on the largest possible scale.”