Marymount University welcomes Dr. Anne Magro as the new Dean of the College of Business, Innovation, Leadership and Technology (BILT). In this role, she will be responsible for leading and shaping the academic and administrative direction of the College. She aims to empower students, faculty and staff to combine creativity, technology, business insights and leadership skills to pursue success.
What was your career path before Marymount?
I began my doctoral studies at the University of Illinois, where I built lifelong friendships and collaborations with outstanding faculty and students. My first postgraduate job was at Rutgers University, where I worked with a diverse student body that included many first-generation students and Pell Grant recipients. This experience sparked my passion for teaching similar populations.
After earning tenure at the University of Oklahoma and a year as a visiting professor at the University of Texas, I spent 17 years at George Mason University advancing into leadership roles — associate dean, interim dean and senior associate dean — all with the support of a great mentor. Then, the opportunity at Marymount arose and here I am today.
What prepared you for this new role?
My position at Mason as senior associate dean for strategy and impact best prepared me, as I really got to see the whole college and the whole university and find out how all the pieces work. It was about being a connector, identifying opportunities, seeing different individuals and finding the places where they could benefit from the relationship.
What is something surprising not on your résumé?
I love snakes, they’re the coolest animals. I love holding them, watching them, the way they feel and move and the role they play in the ecosystem.
I was also a Girl Scout camp counselor for seven years through high school and college. This was, in a sense, my first foray into education. Every moment is a teachable one when you’re working with kids. It goes back to empowering people and giving them agency, but doing so safely. You put some boundaries on it so they can learn and fail safely.
Describe your passion for higher education.
I once had the opportunity to see a talk by Simon Sinek, and he talked about purpose. He recommends that everybody sit down and think about what their purpose is. Mine is to improve the world by enabling others to make positive change. As an educator, you are a multiplier. It’s not necessarily the effect you have but the one you create. A big part of my passion for education is how I’ve impacted thousands of students over my career who now have skill sets and knowledge that allow them to make change.
I firmly believe in the transformative power of education to change lives. It’s not just about changing the trajectory of one student’s life — it really can change the trajectory of entire families. That’s something that I’m really passionate about, something that gets me up in the morning and gets me coming to work every single day.
How do you define success at an academic institution?
It has to be multi-dimensional. For our students, it’s about achieving their academic, professional and personal goals. For our faculty and staff, we want them to grow and develop while achieving their own goals. We are a place where we generate knowledge and convene thinkers — so to succeed, we must contribute to the body of knowledge out there and move the world forward while serving society. The final element for me is that an institution is responsible to its local community. A successful institution gives back and helps the local community thrive.
What has been your proudest professional moment?
One of the most satisfying moments was leading our undergraduate business degree redesign at George Mason. I was happy with the outcome, but it was really about the process we used and the way we managed change, brought a large team together and thought about who needed to be at the table to make sure we did this in a way where we produced a good product and that the entire community could get behind it. Deans see where we can go, how we can get there and how we can pull the community together to work towards a common goal. Ultimately, it’s not about me but the team.
What do you hope to bring to Marymount as the new Dean of the College of BILT?
BILT has a unique combination of disciplines in the School of Business, School of Technology and Innovation and School of Design and Art. I’m excited about the synergies that could exist and the possibilities of bringing those three together and leveraging that combination to move our University forward and bring about success for students, faculty and staff. I see my job as being the chief storyteller, cheerleader and enabler to help us get where we want to be.
