Bryan F. Coker

Bryan F. Coker is the President of Maryville College, serving as only the College’s 12th President in a history exceeding 200 years.

From early 2013 to June 2020, Dr. Coker served as Vice President and Dean of Students as well as Acting President for Goucher College in Baltimore. As Vice President and Dean of Students, Coker provided leadership for a large and functionally-diverse division of the college, including all student affairs areas, athletics, campus dining, the equestrian program and campus safety. He led the creation of the Center for Race, Equity, and Identity (CREI), and provided leadership for over $100 million in capital improvement projects at Goucher, including the development of a new campus dining facility, a first-year student residential village, an athletics master plan, a new student counseling center and the physical relocation and reuse of three 1950s-era residence halls. As Acting President, Coker provided transitional leadership, substantially restructuring Goucher’s senior staff, and undertaking reviews of the Admissions/Enrollment Management and Advancement areas.

Prior to Goucher, Coker served for 10 years as Dean of Students for Jacksonville University (Florida), a private residential liberal arts university of over 3,000 students with Division I athletic programs. In this role, he led numerous initiatives, such as the planning and development of a new student center and 500-bed residence hall, and the creation and endowment of the Student Solutions Center and Ross Movie Theater. He founded and led the Employee Advisory Council, an organization that gave staff and administrative employees a previously-nascent voice in governance, and also advised students in the creation and implementation of a new student governance system, the JU Student Alliance.

Coker also served in administration at the University of Tennessee, being named Director of Student Judicial Affairs at the age of 25 and was the first non-attorney to hold the position. He investigated and resolved critical and sensitive cases of misconduct, including matters with national media coverage arising from the Division I athletic programs.

While in Baltimore, Coker also served as an Affiliated Faculty Member at Morgan State University, a public HBCU, teaching master’s and doctoral-level courses in higher education administration. He has also served as a Peer Evaluator for the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, and on accreditation teams for Bard College (including Bard High School Early Colleges), Gratz College, Skidmore College and will visit Union College (NY) in 2020. He is a 2018 graduate of the Executive Leadership Academy, which prepares higher education leaders for college and university presidencies, and is sponsored by the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC) and the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU).

Coker has served on various non-profit boards, including as Co-Founder, President, and a Host Parent for Solace for the Children–Jacksonville, a humanitarian peacebuilding organization that brought children from Afghanistan to Florida for life-changing medical care. Over a three-year period, the organization brought more than 45 Afghan children to Jacksonville and provided $10 million in charitable medical care. He is an ordained Elder and Liturgist in the Presbyterian Church (USA).

Originally from North Carolina, Coker received his B.A. from Rhodes College in Memphis, is a member of the college’s Hall of Fame, and was previously recognized as their first-ever Young Alumnus of the Year. He holds an M.Ed. from the University of South Carolina, and a Ph.D. from the University of Tennessee. He is married to Rhodes classmate Sara Barnette Coker. They have four children, including a first-year student at Florida Southern College (Lakeland, Fla.), and reside in Maryville.