Steven Culver has been named associate provost for institutional effectiveness at Virginia Tech.

Since 2014, Culver has served as assistant provost for assessment and evaluation, leading the team of professionals in the Office of Assessment and Evaluation in the development of new initiatives to facilitate a culture of continuous improvement across the university.

Under his leadership, new processes for academic assessment, administrative assessment, and academic program review provided opportunities for reflective, data-informed decision-making. In addition, Culver also played a key role in the recent Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges reaffirmation process.  He first joined the office as an assistant director in 2007.

“I look forward to the opportunity to expand the work of the Office of Assessment and Evaluation and the Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness to strengthen ongoing, data-informed planning and evaluation efforts at the university,” said Culver.  “It will be exciting to be able to provide information to administrators, faculty, and staff that will help build an environment that will ensure our students’ success.”

In this new role, Culver will provide leadership for overall institutional effectiveness and accreditation efforts at Virginia Tech.

“With the increasing demands of external accountability and expectations for real-time management information systems, a holistic approach to institutional effectiveness is needed,” said Ken Smith, vice provost for resource management and institutional effectiveness. “Steve’s background as a faculty member and his national profile in the area of assessment of learning outcomes will enable him to better connect our internal management information processes to the improvement of operations and also continue to assure external stakeholders that we are accomplishing the goals we have set ourselves.”

Prior to coming to Virginia Tech, Steve held a variety of academic positions at Radford University and was a tenured professor in the School of Social Work in the Waldron College of Health and Human Services. He also served terms as chair of the Radford University Institutional Review Board and as assistant director of the honors program. 

Culver has been published widely in the areas of educational evaluation, teaching, and assessment. He has also held several editorial positions for academic journals, including guest editor of a special edition of the European Journal of Higher Education focused on assessment. In addition, Culver has co-facilitated, with administrators from Lund University (Sweden), the annual Riva Institute, a global conversation on assessment, evaluation, and quality in higher education.  

Culver received a bachelor's degree in English from Ohio Northern University, and a master's degree in English and a Ph. D. in educational research and evaluation from Virginia Tech. 

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