McSwain Named Dean of B-CU Online College

Dr. Arletha McSwain was recently appointed as the Dean for the Online College and Professor of Education at Bethune-Cookman University. The B-CU Online College offers two fully online graduate degree programs in Transformative Leadership and Criminal Justice, and three fully online undergraduate degree programs in Liberal Studies, Hospitality Management and RN to BSN.

She previously held the position as the Dean of Extended Learning and Professor of Education at Norfolk State University. During her tenure at Norfolk State University, she provided leadership and academic expertise to support the design, development and execution of the distance education programs in keeping with accreditation and federal guidelines. She was instrumental in assisting with the development of the seven high quality and fully online degrees at Norfolk University. 

It was this same exemplary leadership that resulted in Norfolk State University’s distance education programs receiving Quality Standards Certification offered by the United States Distance Learning Association. Norfolk State University is the first HBCU in the nation and the first university in Virginia to receive this national recognition. 

McSwain is the 2011 award recipient for Innovative Excellence in Teaching, Learning and Technology - International Conference on College Teaching and Learning. She is a nationally known content expert on issues related to early childhood education, and early childhood special education while targeting males of diversity. She has written numerous successful grant proposals totaling over $6 million dollars. 

Nationally, she serves as a consultant to mentor other faculty in the area of early childhood special education program development thus enabling these faculty to secure external funding. McSwain has numerous publications and is part of a cohort of content experts who review personnel grant proposals for the U. S. Department of Education- Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services. She graduated from the University of Missouri-Columbia with a Ph.D. in Early Childhood Special Education.