Atlanta — August 16, 2006

The Board of Regents’ chief spokesperson, Arlethia Perry-Johnson, soon will begin a new assignment in the University System of Georgia (USG), following today’s announcement by Kennesaw State University President Daniel S. Papp that she has been named as the special assistant to the president at the growing metropolitan Atlanta public state university.

Perry-Johnson is currently the associate vice chancellor for Media and Publications for the Board of Regents, and has headed the Board of Regents’ communications operation since February 1995.

“Arlethia has done a wonderful job during her tenure at the Board of Regents,” said USG Chancellor Erroll B. Davis Jr. “She has worked diligently and successfully to raise the System’s national profile and broaden its communications efforts. We are indeed losing a valuable and long-time member of the University System Office team, but we are fortunate her talents will continue to serve the System in her new role at Kennesaw State University.”

Regent Elridge McMillan, whose 30-plus-years of service on the Board of Regents spans Perry-Johnson’s tenure, said, “I am delighted that Arlethia is moving into a position that will provide her a broader range of responsibilities and will advance her professional career. However, her departure from the University System Office is bittersweet, as we lose her wise counsel and her obvious love of her work, which she does extraordinarily well. Arlethia epitomizes professionalism.”

“It has been my great pleasure to work with Arlethia since she joined the Board of Regents in 1995,” said Senior Vice Chancellor for External Affairs Thomas E. Daniel, to whom Perry-Johnson reports. “Over the years she has been a consummate professional and has served the regents and the University System with keen insight, grace, and candor. Perhaps the best tribute to her skills and character is the respect she enjoys for her work as our chief spokesperson.”

During Perry-Johnson’s 11-year tenure at the Board of Regents, she served three chancellors and one interim chancellor, while providing strategic communications counsel to the Board’s senior leadership, University System Office staff, and the presidents of the 35 institutions that comprise the USG. She built an award-winning staff to support the Media & Publication unit’s work to heighten the University System’s national presence in higher education, to broaden its communications and marketing outreach, and to increase communications efforts with all USG campuses. She also served as the Board of Regents’ Open Records officer.

Perry-Johnson worked to strengthen the University System’s ties to the community through her service on a wide range of boards and committees that work on education issues, including on the executive committees of the regional Council for Advancement and Support of Education, the Georgia Council on Economic Education, and Communities in Schools of Georgia, among other national and local organizations.

In 2002, Perry-Johnson assumed a leadership role as the project director for the board’s African-American Male Initiative (AAMI). The initiative has become a national model for its work to increase the numbers of African-American males who enroll in college.

Perry-Johnson most recently secured a $100,000 grant from the Lumina Foundation’s McCabe Fund for AAMI. She will continue to head the AAMI project for the University System, while serving in her new position at Kennesaw State.

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