Office of the President
Susan Schultz Huxman, PhD, has served for more than 38 years in higher education in
a variety of faculty and senior administrative and academic leadership roles. She
has served as Eastern Mennonite University’s ninth president for the past nine years.
She is EMU’s first woman president and first academic president, earning the rank
of full professor.
Dr. Huxman announced her retirement earlier this year noting “EMU is more than a job;
it is a ministry.” “I have been honored and humbled to ‘tend the vine’ for this time,
and I look forward to graduating with the class of 2025 and leaning into the finish
line as I round the last lap.”
Leadership Experience
During her tenure at EMU, Dr. Huxman has advanced the university’s strategic direction; created a more welcoming and inclusive community; provided stability and guidance through the global pandemic; sharpened EMU’s mission, vision and values; and leaned into its Anabaptist heritage and core scriptural mandate to “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God.” (Micah 6:8)
Dr. Huxman led the university in setting a fundraising record of $9.2 million during
EMU’s Centennial year and has steered EMU through the second year of its $40-million,
first-ever comprehensive campaign for people, programs and facilities, Forward Together:
Preparing Tomorrow’s Unifying Leaders 2023-2028, which raised more than $21 million
in gifts and commitments in the first two years.
Dr. Huxman served as president of Conrad Grebel University in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada,
from 2011 to 2016. Previously, she served in senior administrative positions in the
Elliott School of Communication at Wichita State University in Kansas and Wake Forest
University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Awards and Achievements
Dr. Huxman has won numerous awards and recognitions for teaching excellence and continues to teach and mentor when she can. She is a passionate ambassador of a faith-based liberal arts education and has made it her mission to open doors of access and belonging for diverse students who aspire to be unifying leaders. Dr. Huxman holds a bachelor of arts in English from Bethel College (Kansas) and a master of arts and PhD in communication from the University of Kansas.
Both Dr. Huxman and her husband, Jesse, graduated from Bethel College, the oldest Mennonite college in North America. Jesse serves as communication manager for Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS), USA. They have three adult children, all of whom graduated from different Mennonite colleges, two sons-in law and a daughter-in-law (also all graduates of Mennonite colleges), and four grandchildren all under the age of four: Jonah, Eloise, Rex and Sutton. Not difficult to guess what kind of college they may be attending!
