Keith Motley | GBH

interim chancellor, UMass Boston

Keith Motley, Ph.D., is the eighth chancellor of the University of Massachusetts Boston. He leads an institution with approximately 13,500 undergraduate and graduate students, a full-time and part-time faculty of more than 800, and a $254 million annual budget. Between 2005 and his appointment as chancellor which began on July 1, 2007, Dr. Motley served as vice president for business, marketing, and public affairs at the University of Massachusetts President’s Office, where he reported directly to President Jack M. Wilson, working closely with university leaders and the Board of Trustees. Prior to joining the President’s Office, he was the interim chancellor of the University of Massachusetts Boston, where he previously had served as vice chancellor for student affairs, following a twenty-plus-year career in higher education administration that included ten years as dean of student services at Northeastern University. As vice president for business, marketing, and public affairs at the University of Massachusetts President’s Office, Dr. Motley was instrumental in leading strategic, system-wide initiatives and working closely with the Board of Trustees committees on advancement and athletics. He instituted the Development Council, comprised of vice chancellors from the five University of Massachusetts campuses, to improve collaboration on fundraising and facilitate that process. He also led an executive team of representatives that determined the selection of marketing firms that will provide the University of Massachusetts with a unified and updated branding strategy. Dr. Motley’s responsibilities in the President’s Office also included building external relationships with K-12 specialists and higher education policy leaders, locally and federally; creating relationships with corporations; and working with functional networks such as associations. He was the designee to the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education Blue Ribbon Task Force on Student Financial Aid and the American Council on Education (ACE) Solutions for the Future Project. Dr. Motley also served on the Boston Foundation’s Steering Committee for the Carol G. Goldberg Seminar on Higher Education-Community Partnerships, The Role and Impact of Colleges and Universities in Greater Boston Today. A founder of the Roxbury Preparatory Charter School and chair emeritus of the school’s Board of Trustees, Dr. Motley serves as the immediate past chair of the Board of Trustees of Newbury College in Brookline. He also serves on numerous boards of community organizations, including the American Red Cross of Eastern Massachusetts, Freedom House, Morgan Memorial Goodwill Industries, Inc., the United Way of Massachusetts Bay, ACCESS, the Boston Private Industry Council and the Dimock Community Health Center. He is the founder and education chair of Concerned Black Men of Massachusetts, Inc., and the Paul Robeson Institute for Positive Self-Development. Dr. Motley also chairs the Boston Committee Initiative’s Do the Write Thing Challenge of the National Campaign to Stop Violence. He is a member of Iota Phi Theta fraternity and Sigma Pi Phi fraternity Beta Beta Boule. J. Keith Motley holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Northeastern University and a doctorate from Boston College. He is a proud graduate of the University of Pittsburgh’s Upward Bound Program. He is married to Angela Motley and is the father of Keith Jr., Kayla, and Jordan.