Meet the Provost

Provost White claps for the graduates at a recent commencement ceremony
A historian by training and an advocate by calling, Dr. Calvin White Jr. was named Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor in the spring of 2023.

Provost Calvin White headshot in front of bookshelf

Leading the Pack

Stepping into the role of the chief academic officer and second-in-command of the university, White is the first African American named provost at A-State.

White oversees the university’s largest division, including all academic colleges, among them Agriculture, Business, Education and Behavioral Science, Engineering and Computer Science, Liberal Arts and Communication, Nursing and Health Professions, Science and Mathematics, University College, the Graduate School, and the forthcoming College of Veterinary Medicine.  

His portfolio also includes key community outreach initiatives such as the Arkansas State Heritage Sites, the A-State Museum, and one of the region’s largest ROTC programs. He serves as the chief liaison to the Arkansas Biosciences Institute and has already played a central role in the university’s academic reorganization 

Prior Roles

Before his arrival at Arkansas State, White served as associate dean of the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, where he helped lead the campus’s largest academic unit. His administrative portfolio included oversight of multiple departments, programs, centers, and schools, among them the Pryor Center for Arkansas Oral and Visual History, the Diane Blair Center for Southern Politics and Society, and the Arkansas Humanities Center. He previously served as a chair of the Department of History and program director of African and African American Studies within the college, further deepening his leadership experience across academic levels. 

A recipient of numerous honors for teaching, advising, and service, White was awarded the Fulbright Master Teacher Award and the Dr. John and Mrs. Lois Imhoff Award for Outstanding Teaching and Student Mentorship. He was inducted into the University of Arkansas Teaching Academy and selected as a fellow in the SEC Academic Leadership Development Program. In addition, he held a Gilder-Lehrman Fellowship at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, New York. 

Education & Family

White completed his Ph.D. in history at the University of Mississippi after earning his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Central Arkansas. Focusing on the history of the American South, his research in the African American experience—particularly in the Arkansas and Mississippi Delta—has led to multiple publications. His first book, The Rise to Respectability: Race, Religion, and the Church of God in Christ, was released in October 2012. 

A native Arkansan, White enjoys reading, traveling, and spending time with family. An avid explorer, he has spent significant time in Europe and across both east and west Africa, journeys that have enriched his personal scholarship and broadened his global outlook. A proud girl dad, White considers his greatest accomplishments to be those of husband and father, roles he values above all others.