Biographical statement

Ilene Crawford, PhD is the founder and principal of Ilene Crawford Consulting, where she serves as a confidential thought partner for higher education leaders. Drawing on her experience as a Provost and senior administrator, she helps clients cultivate their unique strengths, discern their agency, build institutional mindsets, and navigate the public scrutiny of senior leadership with steadiness. She particularly enjoys working with chairs, directors, deans, and provosts who are navigating new and/or interim roles during periods of significant institutional change. 

From 2020–2025, Crawford was Provost, Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Professor of English at Cornell College, Mount Vernon, Iowa. From 2020–2023, she also served as Vice President of Student Affairs. Cornell College is a small, independent liberal arts college, known for its distinctive One Course At A Time academic calendar and experiential learning opportunities. Cornell College is a member of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest, the nation’s oldest regional consortium of liberal arts colleges. She served as an Executive Committee member of the ACMs Advisory Board of Chief Academic Officers from 2023–25.

Prior to her appointment at Cornell College, Crawford was associate vice president for academic affairs at Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven, Connecticut from 2015–2020, where she oversaw interdisciplinary studies, international education, faculty development, the writing center, the first-year experience, and the general education program, and managed institutional-level curricular approvals and accreditation. As a faculty member, she taught and served in director roles in English, women’s studies, and interdisciplinary studies at SCSU from 2000–2015.

Crawford has published and presented in the U.S. and Asia on higher education reform, writing pedagogy, women’s literacy practices, and travel narratives. A two-time Fulbright Scholar, she traveled to Vietnam in 2010 on a Fulbright teaching fellowship and in 2015–16 on a Fulbright research fellowship, lecturing across Vietnam on higher education policy and reform, teacher training, and curriculum development. 

Crawford completed the American Academic Leadership Institute's (AALI) Executive Leadership Academy (ELA) in 2022–23 and the HERS (Higher Education Resource Services) Wellesley Institute for Women in Higher Education Administration in 2013–2014.

She holds a doctorate in English from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, a master’s degree in English from the State University of New York-Binghamton, and a bachelor of special studies degree in classics from Cornell College. 

Connect with Ilene on LinkedIn.