UEDA’s Board of Director’s is a group of committed individuals who work at all levels of higher education, including chancellors, presidents, directors, managers and professors. Each member brings their unique perspective and experience to round out our leadership and inform the direction of the organization. Those institutions and organizations who currently allow their employees to serve on the Board comprise the UEDA Leadership Council.

Executive Committee

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Julia Potter is the Director of Educational Partnerships Development & Special University Projects at California State University, Northridge (CSUN).  Her responsibilities include a wide-range of external relations activities including establishing university-wide partnerships with businesses and industries for contracted applied research and customized workforce development programs, developing relationships for grants and sponsored programs and fostering regional economic and community development initiatives.  She serves as the point-of-contact for CSUN’s Elevate Campaign, a business development strategy conceived by campus leadership when state funding was significantly reduced.  She is a key stakeholder in the CSUN Innovates! initiative, leading the CSUN Innovates! Interest Group (115+ members) and serving on the CSUN Innovates! Executive Steering Committee.

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Rebecca is the Chief Corporate Engagement & Economic Development Officer at Kansas State University Innovation Partners, where she leads the organization’s corporate engagement and economic development efforts, including the university/community economic development partnership, Knowledge-Based Economic Development, LLC in Manhattan, KS.

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Jim’s 30+ year career has spanned multiple areas of expertise and impacts. To date, he has worked in:

• Community development where he and his partners demonstrably improved quality of life in regions through higher education engagement, outreach, and public service
• Education, training, and workforce development, including strategies for design and delivery of programs
• Research and Development and innovation, including technological advancement, entrepreneurship, and regional technology-based economic development

From 2011 to 2018, Jim worked at the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) in a number of roles, most recently as vice president for economic development and community engagement. He worked closely with member institutions to develop tools and resources to enhance their regional engagement and economic development efforts. He served as the staff director for APLU’s Commission on Innovation, Competitiveness and Economic Prosperity

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Genna Hurd is an Associate Researcher for the Institute for Policy & Social Research (IPSR) at the University of Kansas and Co-Investigator for the KU University Center, KU Entrepreneurship Works for Kansas. The EDA-funded University Center is a partnership effort between IPSR and the KU Center for Entrepreneurship in the School of Business.

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Russell W. Mills, Ph.D. is the Senior Director of the Center for Regional Development at Bowling Green State University (BGSU). Dr. Mills leads CRD’s Economic Development Administration (EDA) University Center program that provides technical assistance, data, analytics, and applied research to local businesses and economic development professionals. He has significant expertise and experience in demographic and economic data analysis, economic impact analysis, economic development planning processes, workforce development initiatives, and grant writing.

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Members-At-Large

Margo leads facilitation, strategic planning, and client services for CED. Previously, she served as CED’s Lead Analyst and worked in the education sector for numerous school districts and universities in California and Alaska, as well as served as a VISTA volunteer with UCLA BruinCorps.

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Ms. Golemi is the Director of the EDA University Center at Georgia Tech. The University Center (UC) program is specifically designed to marshal the resources located within colleges and universities to support regional economic development strategies in regions of chronic and acute economic distress. She is also Senior Research Faculty at Georgia Tech.

In her current role, Ms. Golemi leads programs that provide support to communities and other universities with their innovation-led economic development initiatives. These initiatives foster collaborations among informal network players to drive public policy, strategic planning, startup ecosystem formation, and fiscal and economic impact metrics. Her background includes sixteen years of experience in the field of economic development in the private sector and higher education. Ms. Golemi has expertise in turning complex data into information that leads to strategic decisions and the realization of aggressive goals.

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Dominique Halaby, D.P.A. is the Director of the Business Innovation Group (BIG) at Georgia Southern University. BIG includes the Center for Business Analytics and Economic Research, Center for Entrepreneurial Learning and Leadership, Small Business Development Center, Innovation Incubator and Fab Lab. In 2015, BIG was recognized as a Gold Award Winner in Entrepreneurship by the IEDC.

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Matt Hebb is an Atlantic Canadian leader, with a proven ability to bring together partners and organizations on transformative and innovative projects across the region.

Matt joined Dalhousie University in 2013 and serves on the executive team as Assistant Vice-president, Government Relations and Economic Development, where he co-leads Dalhousie’s strategic priority to foster innovation, entrepreneurship, and creativity.

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Eddie Pauline serves as the Director for Economic Engagement for The Ohio State University’s Corporate Engagement Office. This office houses Ohio State’s efforts with technology commercialization, strategic partnerships, startup companies and economic development. In his role, Eddie leads the office’s Economic Development function, supporting business retention, expansion and attraction efforts in partnership with local and statewide economic development partners. These efforts drive new opportunities to University faculty, staff and students in the form of strategic partnerships and help enhance Ohio State’s overall economic impact to the State of Ohio which currently stands at more than $15 billion. Prior to this role, Eddie served as the founding Director of Ohio State’s Buckeye Leadership Fellows Program (BLF), Ohio State’s premier student leadership program. Eddie led the daily operations of the program which included the design and creationof the curriculum, instructing and mentoring students, and outreach andengagement. As Director, Eddie worked to build a board of advisors to secureover two million dollars in private financial support for the program.

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Mary Frances Postupack is the Vice President for Economic Development and Research Support at East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania. She manages the ESU division of Research and Economic Development (RED) which includes an award-winning Business Accelerator Program, the Office of Workforce Development, Entrepreneurial Leadership Center, and the Office of Sponsored Projects and Research which secured in excess of $38 million from FY02-11. Mary Frances has over 20 years of experience in the areas of education, business, community and economic development. She received a BS from the Pennsylvania State University, M.Ed. from East Stroudsburg University, and Corporate Entrepreneurship Certification from Lehigh University. She is a certified Stephen Covey Trainer and was recognized as one of the top 25 women in business in NE PA by the Northeast Pennsylvania Business Journal.

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Jeffrey Sachse is the Interim Director of CCRS.  In this role he is responsible for providing research and development support for several university initiatives, including the Oshkosh Community Success Coalition, Forum for Innovation, and Wisconsin Aerospace Partners.  He also works closely with the Center for Customized Research Services to serve a variety of client and partner needs. He is passionate about the developing the data analytics capacity of the University and broader region.  Finally, Mr. Sachse is affiliated with the Department of Public Administration and Office of Continuing Education through several teaching assignments.

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Lenore VanderZee is the Executive Director for University Relations at the State University of New York at Canton, where she oversees economic development initiatives (including the Small Business Development Center), public & community relations, and government relations. She is the campuslead for the creation of an innovative community-serving Entrepreneurship Center in downtown Canton. She is passionate about rural economic development and placemaking in her beloved North Country New York region.

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Marce is an experienced business owner with clients ranging from universities, not-for-profit organizations, F2000 companies, government institutions to start-ups. She brings a deep knowledge of both qualitative and quantitative methods to her strategy work and CFO/Bookkeeping practices. She helps clients grasp opportunities for growth by developing business strategies and internal processes necessary to address such opportunities. She has worked for global companies such as UNICEF, National Institute for the Indians in Mexico, IBM, and several leading Universities and Museums in Mexico, Europe and USA. 

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Ex-Officio Members

Brian Richard is Assistant Director for Center for Governmental Studies’ Workforce Development team. At CGS, his most recent work concentrates on the evaluation of state and local workforce development and training programs. He also has extensive experience estimating the impacts of economic development projects, local retail and industrial analysis, and research into the health of regional economies.

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