Special Campus Memo: Vice-President for Finance and Treasurer of the College Appointment

Dear Grinnellians:

I am pleased to announce that Keith A. Archer will be the next Vice-President for Finance and Treasurer of the College at Grinnell College. Keith is currently the vice president for finance and administrative services for Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. Grinnell and Knox are two of the 14 members of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM) partnership. Keith will begin work at Grinnell this summer.

As a member of the senior leadership team, Keith will provide strategic vision, leadership, and direction for the College's financial operations, as well as for human resources, facilities management, risk management, and auxiliary services. Keith brings extensive operational and financial management experience to our already strong financial position, and he will be a great asset to the consensus-driven administrative culture at Grinnell. I look forward to the leadership he will bring to this critical position.

Keith comes to Grinnell with a broad business background and proven track record of financial oversight and institutional planning in the non-profit and for-profit sectors. He has more than 35 years of professional experience, including nearly 13 years in higher education administration at Knox, and at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana.

While at Knox, Keith chaired the college's institutional planning and priorities council, co-chaired its risk management committee, successfully negotiated collective bargaining agreements, and created a new financial reporting package for the board of trustees' committee on finance.

Previously, Keith was executive director of finance and controller at DePauw, where he was responsible for all daily treasury functions of the university. He also oversaw the operations of the business office, coordinated the annual audit, was responsible for tax reporting and other compliance requirements, assisted with the development of a university-wide process for timely and accurate preparation and reporting for the annual budget, served on the university resource prioritization task force, worked with a team which facilitated the move of the university bookstore to the downtown corridor as part of a grant-funded development project, and supervised the accounting and reporting for the university's endowment.

Keith also has worked in public accounting, manufacturing compliance and production supervision, retail management, real estate management, development, and construction.

Keith holds a B.S. degree in Accounting from Maryville University in St. Louis, Missouri. He is a certified public accountant and a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

At Grinnell, Keith will help steward the financial resources of the College in partnership with the president, the senior leadership team, and the board, ensuring Grinnell's position at the forefront of liberal-arts education. Alongside the other members of the senior leadership team, he also will assume a broad leadership role in the development and continuous improvement of administrative practices across the institution.

Please join me in welcoming Keith and his wife, Melissa, to Grinnell.

Sincerely,
 
Raynard S. Kington
President