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Regular Session, 2014 ENROLLED
SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTI ON NO. 126
BY SENATORS GALLOT, ADLEY, ALARIO, ALLAIN, AMEDEE, APPEL, BROOME,
BROWN, BUFFINGTON, CHABERT, CLAITOR, CORTEZ, CROWE,
DONAHUE, DORSEY-COLOMB, ERDEY, GUILLORY, HEITMEIER,
JOHNS, KOSTELKA, LAFLEUR, LONG, MARTINY, MILLS,
MORRELL, MORRISH, MURRAY, NEVERS, PEACOCK, PERRY,
PETERSON, RISER, GARY SMITH, JOHN SMITH, TARVER,
THOMPSON, WAL SWORTH, WARD AND WHI TE AND
REPRESENTATIVES KATRINA JACKSON, JEFFERSON, PRICE
AND SHADOIN
A CONCURRENT RESOLUTI ON
To commend Dr. Frank G. Pogue, President of Grambling State University, for his
commitment, service, singular contributions, and outstanding accomplishments and
to express gratitude for his exemplary term of dedicated and highly productive public
service.
WHEREAS, Dr. Frank George Pogue is a highly respected educator and
administrator with a wealth of experience as an agent of positive institutional change and
advancement, evidenced by a long and distinguished fifty-two year career in higher
education; and
WHEREAS, he was appointed as the eighth President of Grambling State University
in June 2010, after serving for seven months as interim president; and
WHEREAS, Dr. Pogue has led the university in removing the university from a
SACS warning status to unquestioned accreditation; reducing the number of negative audits
by the Louisiana Legislative Auditors from nine to zero resulting in, for the first time in
recent memory, the university receiving a clean audit; experiencing an undergraduate and
graduate enrollment increase for each of the past several years; acquiring an additional one
hundred forty-seven acres of land and forty-seven buildings to enhance university growth;
successfully meeting and exceeding new legislative performance measures; initiating action
to implement fundraising initiatives to replace state funding budget cuts and increase
scholarships for students; enhancing campus beautification projects; improving facilities and
upgrading the infrastructure; establishing comprehensive strategic and inclusive planning
processes; created ten university-wide goals and priorities; and initiating numerous activities
designed to enhance community on the campus and in surrounding communities; and SCR NO. 126 ENROLLED
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WHEREAS, prior to his appointment at Grambling State University, Dr. Pogue was
selected as the fifteenth president of Edinboro University of Pennsylvania in 1996, becoming
the first African American to serve as president of a historically white university in the state
of Pennsylvania; and
WHEREAS, during his eleven years as president of Edinboro, he was hailed as a
catalyst behind the "grievance-to-graciousness" transformation on the Edinboro University
campus and when he retired in 2007, the university paid tribute to Dr. Pogue's extraordinary
leadership by naming its newly constructed student center in his honor and his outstanding
accomplishments also earned him the title of President Emeritus of Edinboro University and
an Honorary Doctorate of Public Service; and
WHEREAS, Dr. Pogue's career has spanned a variety of institutions including
historically black and historically white; large, medium and small; urban and rural; north,
south and southwest; public and private; church-related; single gender and co-ed and he has
developed many funded research and lectureship initiatives and has an impressive list of
publications and speeches on a variety of topics; and
WHEREAS, he has extensive experience with regional higher education
accreditation, having served over thirty-five years working with the Middle States
Association of Colleges and Universities, the Western Association of Colleges and
Universities, and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools; and
WHEREAS, Dr. Pogue has published extensively, served on a variety of state,
national and international boards and board committees, has received numerous honors, and
is a member of many academic, social and service groups including Alpha Phi Alpha
Fraternity, Inc., and a life-member of Alpha Phi Omega National Service Fraternity; and
WHEREAS, he received his undergraduate degree in sociology from Alabama State
University, a master's degree in Sociology from Atlanta University (now Clark-Atlanta
University), and his PhD in Sociology from the University of Pittsburgh; and
WHEREAS, under Dr. Pogue's leadership, Grambling State University now enrolls
over five thousand undergraduate and graduate students, offers degrees in fifty academic
programs, is fully accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and one
hundred per cent of its academic programs that are eligible for accreditation are accredited. SCR NO. 126 ENROLLED
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THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Legislature of Louisiana does hereby
commend Dr. Frank G. Pogue for his outstanding accomplishments upon his retirement as
president of Grambling State University, does hereby record for posterity his commitment,
contributions, and remarkable service as president, does hereby express enduring gratitude
for his extraordinary contributions, and does hereby extend to him best wishes for full
measures of success and happiness in all of his future endeavors.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that a copy of this Resolution be transmitted to
Dr. Frank G. Pogue.
PRESIDENT OF THE SENATE
SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES