T.J.Bryan, associate vice chancellor for academic affairs of the University System of Maryland, has been named vice chancellor for academic and student affairs of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education.

“I want to do everything I can to help move the State System forward, to help it to achieve even greater eminence and excellence,” she said. “Dr. Hample wants to move a very good system to an even higher level, and I certainly want to be part of that.”

Bryan will assume her new duties July 1. She will replace Mary W. Burger, who plans to retire June 30. Burger has been with the State System as a vice chancellor since 1993.

Bryan earned a bachelor’s degree in English-speech and a master’s degree in English, both from Morgan State College in Baltimore, and a doctoral degree in English language and literature, specializing in modern American literature, early American literature and Victorian literature, from the University of Maryland at College Park.

She also is a graduate of Leadership Maryland, the Millennium Leadership Institute offered by the American Association of State Colleges and Universities and the Harvard University Management Development Program.

Bryan has held a number of faculty and administrative posts. She began teaching at Coppin State College in Baltimore as an instructor of developmental English in 1979. She was appointed to the rank of assistant professor of English language and literature and director of the college’s Honors Program in 1982.

Five years later she was promoted to the rank of associate professor and was named chair of the Department of Languages, Literature and Journalism. While serving as department chair, Bryan successfully competed for one of the nation’s 14 original Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement Programs.

In 1990, Bryan was appointed dean of the Honors Division and was promoted to the rank of professor. As dean, Bryan led strategic planning for the division and managed a $1 million annual budget. She redesigned the Honors Program to include not only academic-preparation and cultural-enrichment components, but also a community-service requirement.

A year after being chosen to lead the Honors Division at Coppin State, Bryan was concurrently appointed dean of Arts and Sciences, a position she held for seven years. During that time she led strategic-planning efforts, was active in private fund-raising and developed partnerships with businesses that helped create faculty and student opportunities in the workplace.

For the last four years, Bryan has served as associate vice chancellor for academic affairs for the University System of Maryland. In that position, she has participated in the development and review of Board of Regents’ and institutional policies, has served on the System Office’s Policy Group and the Chancellor’s Council; has implemented department chairs’ conferences and workshops; has managed the System’s faculty-grant, faculty-award and professorship programs; and has represented the System during Council of University System Faculty meetings.

Bryan has published and presented extensively on African-American women poets of the early twentieth century and has conducted extensive research on minority achievement and other higher education issues. In addition to Miles to Go: Maryland and The Road Taken, she also wrote the Maryland system’s 1998 minority-achievement plan and was the key architect of the system’s follow-up 2001 plan.

Bryan has won numerous honors and awards, including the Governor’s Citation and a Committee on Institutional Cooperation Appreciation Award. She has served in a variety of leadership roles, ranging from president of the Maryland Collegiate Honors Council during the 1980s to Capital Region coordinator for Leadership Maryland’s Forum for Policy Change in 2001-02.

With more than 98,600 students, the State System of Higher Education is the largest provider of higher education in the Commonwealth. Its 14 universities offer more than 250 degree and certificate programs in more than 120 areas of study. More than 360,000 System alumni live and work in Pennsylvania.

The state-owned universities are Bloomsburg, California, Cheyney, Clarion, East Stroudsburg, Edinboro, Indiana, Kutztown, Lock Haven, Mansfield, Millersville, Shippensburg, Slippery Rock and West Chester Universities of Pennsylvania. The System also operates branch campuses in Clearfield, Kittanning, Oil City and Punxsutawney and several regional centers, including the Dixon University Center in Harrisburg and the University Center for Southwest Pennsylvania in Pittsburgh. The regional centers are part of the Educational Resources Group, which is responsible for coordinating statewide programming.