Contact: Thonnia Lee, Office of Communications, Public Relations and Marketing
The Tuskegee University Board of Trustees announces that Natalie D. Knight ’01, Dr. Patrick M. Oates ’87, and Shaelan Williams, J.D. ’14, have been identified as the three semi-finalists for the alumni Trustee vacancy. Beginning Friday, Aug. 1, all university alumni will be able to cast electronic ballots for their preferred candidate to fill the upcoming Board vacancy.
Knight, who earned a bachelor’s degree in plant and social science in 2001, is a partner in a state and local government relations lobbying firm, Impact Public Affairs, in Atlanta, Georgia. She has served on the Board of Trustees since 2022.
Dr. Patrick M. Oates is senior vice president and chief science officer at EMSCO Scientific Inc., an African-American owned life science company in Philadelphia. He is past president of the Philadelphia Club of the Tuskegee Alumni Association.
Shaelan Williams earned her bachelor’s degree in Sales and Marketing from Tuskegee in 2014. She later earned a law degree from the Jones School of Law in Montgomery, Alabama. She serves as a national manager of Learning and Development at Deloitte LLP, curating learning experiences for over 100,000 employees.
Knight, Williams and Dr. Oates were recommended following a review of nominations by the Ad Hoc Committee on Alumni Trustee Elections. The committee recommended nominees to the Trustees’ Nominating and Board Structure Committee, which narrowed the field to Knight, Oates and Williams.
“We wish to thank everyone who expressed interest in serving Tuskegee University in this unique way as an alumni Trustee,” said Norma Clayton, chair of the Board of Trustees. “Applying for this opportunity, as well as reviewing the applications we received, required much forethought — and, for that, we appreciate all the alumni who were involved in the stages of this process.”
The process, which included a record number of nominations, now shifts to the university’s entire alumni base, which will vote for one of the three candidates through Aug. 15. Online voting, administered by Votenet Solutions Inc., will begin on Friday, Aug. 1. Alumni with email addresses on file with the university will receive an email to that account providing additional instructions on the voting procedures through the eBallot system.
The finalist receiving the most votes will then go before the full Board of Trustees for its consensus. Once the Trustees approve the elected finalist for Board service, the candidate will begin serving as the alumni Trustee at this fall’s meeting of the Board of Trustees. You can learn more about each candidate here.
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