Donde Plowman has served since 2019 as chancellor of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, the state’s flagship land-grant research university. In that time, the university has set new records in student retention and graduation, research, instructional spending, alumni giving, and state support.
UT has a footprint that spans the entire state, including the main campus in Knoxville, the Space Institute in Tullahoma, and the Institute of Agriculture and its Extension offices in all 95 counties. Plowman oversees a campus budget of $2.2 billion as well as more than 38,800 students, 7,500 staff, and 2,000 full-time faculty.
Shortly after her arrival at UT, Plowman created the Division of Student Success to ensure that students receive a wide range of support as they navigate college life. Since then, the university has seen significant results in retention, persistence, and graduation rates while developing a national reputation as an innovative leader in student success. This improved retention, combined with a boom in new student applications, has allowed the university to strategically grow its enrollment by more than 30 percent, creating more opportunities for more students and producing more skilled graduates ready to enter the workforce.
Under Plowman’s leadership, the university has increased its research expenditures to a record $380 million by shifting its focus from individual efforts to big collaborative projects. This change in emphasis has fueled creative solutions and new technologies as well as expanded innovation and economic development partnerships with companies including AT&T, Eastman, and Volkswagen.
Plowman’s role as chancellor includes oversight of Tennessee Athletics, an operation exceeding $200 million, to which she has provided decisive and timely leadership. In 2020 she was selected by her peers in the Southeastern Conference to represent the SEC as a member of the NCAA Presidential Forum, and in 2023 she was elected vice president of the SEC Executive Committee. Plowman is known across the country as an advocate for student-athletes by supporting their pursuits on and off the field.
Before becoming chancellor, she served as dean of the College of Business and then executive vice chancellor at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. She was previously a department head at UT. Plowman is a globally recognized organizational scientist whose scholarship includes the topics of leadership, change management, and strategic decision-making.
