Frances Ward-Johnson
Frances Ward-Johnson, Ph.D., was formerly dean of the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CAHSS) at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. She was also on the board of directors of the National Humanities Alliance (NHA), a nationwide coalition of organizations advocating for the humanities on campuses, in communities and on Capitol Hill, as the only representative from a historically Black college or university.
As CAHSS dean, Ward-Johnson provided oversight for six academic departments: English, criminal justice, history and political science, journalism and mass communication, liberal studies, and visual and performing arts. She led the college’s mission to be responsive to change by preparing students for a global workforce through providing high quality academic programs, scholarly research and services that are innovative and interdisciplinary.
Under Ward-Johnson’s leadership, CAHSS received more than $2.5 million in grant awards through her commitment to show the importance of the impact of the humanities on higher education. In addition, she led the university’s development of a Center of Excellence for Social Justice focused on eliminating social justice inequities. Before joining N.C. A&T, Ward-Johnson served in various leadership roles and as a tenured faculty member at Elon University for 15 years, including as a Faculty Fellow for Leadership in the provost’s office, where she championed the institution’s commitment to leadership education. She co-led study abroad programs to Barbados and Greece and taught a domestic study away course for many years where she guided leadership fellows on a tour of the Deep South to study civil rights and leadership.
Before her tenure at Elon, Ward-Johnson was a faculty member in the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at A&T. Prior to that, she served as the internal and external communications manager for the Center for Creative Leadership, one of the world's top providers of leadership development and executive education, headquartered in Greensboro.
Ward-Johnson was an honors graduate of A&T where she earned a B.A. in English and M.A. in English and African American literature. She held a Ph.D. in mass communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and was a graduate of the Institute of Management and Leadership in Education at Harvard University.