M. Christopher Brown II

Brown previously served as president of the nation's first historically black land-grant institution, Alcorn State University, and was the inaugural Executive Vice President and Provost of the Southern University System and Southern University campus.^{[citation needed]} He held the same position at Fisk University, where he was also a professor.^{[citation needed]}

Prior to this appointment, he served as dean of the College of Education at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, vice president for Programs and Administration at the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, director of Social Justice and Professional Development for the American Educational Research Association, as well as executive director and chief research scientist of the Frederick D. Patterson Research Institute of the United Negro College Fund. Brown has held faculty appointments at Pennsylvania State University, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and the University of Missouri-Kansas City.^[2]

Brown was named president of Alcorn State University in November 2010. In three years with the university, Brown was regarded for efforts to increase enrollment at the historically black college,^[3] which grew to more than 4,000 for the first time in the school's history in 2011.^[4] In October 2012, months after Alcorn was named 'HBCU of the Year' by the Center for HBCU Media Advocacy,^[5] Brown accepted a unanimous four-year extension of his contract from the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees.^[6]

In September 2012, Brown hired Jay Hopson as the first white head football coach in the history of Alcorn State, and the Southwestern Athletic Conference.^[7] In 2014, Hopson and the Braves won the school's first SWAC conference football championship in 20 years.^[8]

In 2013, under Brown's leadership, Alcorn State University unveiled a statue of civil rights activist and ASU alumnus Medgar Evers, the largest of its kind in the world.^[9] That same year, Brown was named HBCU Male President of the Year by the Center for HBCU Media Advocacy.^[10]

Brown resigned from Alcorn State University in 2013 following allegations of improper procurement practices for campus event contracts and facility renovations by the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning.^{[citation needed]} State higher education and law enforcement officials never published direct connections of wrongdoing to Brown's authorization of contracts, and did not file charges against or require reimbursement from any current or former employees.^[11]