CCU President Michael T. Benson strives to exemplify service, scholarship, and teaching in higher education
“I’m truly honored to have been given these awards and opportunities to serve in whatever capacity I can to bring more attention to the great things happening at Coastal Carolina University and within our community,” said Benson.
In recognizing Benson with the Distinguished Patron Award, HGTC President Marilyn Murphy Fore, Ed.D., said: “We are pleased to show our appreciation for Dr. Benson as one of HGTC’s partners in higher education for this local community and statewide. In his two years as president, our partnership with CCU has grown and expanded as one of the strongest recognized partnerships in the state. We appreciate his leadership and support for HGTC and our community.”
Benson began his term on the ODK board of trustees in July 2021. He will serve as board chair-elect during the 2023-24 academic year. In this role, he will chair the Governance and Trusteeship Committee. He will become board chair on July 1, 2024. ODK recognizes superior leadership and exemplary character and encourages collaboration among members across the five pillars of leadership: academics and research, athletics, service to campus and community, communications, and creative and performing arts. Founded in 1914 at Washington and Lee University, ODK champions its leadership values of collaboration, inclusivity, integrity, scholarship, and service. ODK has more than 300 circles of record at colleges and universities across the United States.
“Omicron Delta Kappa is excited that Coastal Carolina University President Michael T. Benson will be serving as the 2023-24 chair-elect of the society’s board of trustees,” said Tara S. Singer, Ed.D., ODK’s president and CEO. “We appreciate his previous leadership with the establishment of two circles (chapters) and his current devotion to the CCU Circle. He has provided thoughtful advice and counsel with his involvement in the organization’s Governance and Trusteeship Committee, and I know Dr. Benson will do a great job in chairing this committee in the coming year.”
The Society of Foundation Professors, EKU’s highest honor for teaching excellence, recognizes faculty members who are “creative, self-motivated exemplars of the ideal college professor.” More than 70 professors have been recognized for teaching excellence by the EKU foundation since the awards were first given in 1988. Benson is only the eighth person to receive the honorary designation. He is president emeritus at EKU, where he served as the 13th president from 2013 to 2020. While at EKU, he held an appointment as professor of government.
“Dr. Benson seemed genuinely touched by his induction into the Society of Foundation Professors, which is the highest recognition one can receive on our campus,” said Thomas H. Appleton Jr., Ph.D., foundation professor of history emeritus at EKU. “To be a Foundation Professor, an individual must be a full professor and actively engaged in the classroom. On rare occasions, a person can be named an honorary Foundation Professor. This has only happened seven other times in the last 35 years. Dr. Benson was enthusiastically welcomed into the society by virtue of his contributions to the university and his record of scholarly excellence.”
Benson became the third president of CCU on Jan. 1, 2021. He also holds the title of professor of history at the University. This fall, Benson will teach a graduate seminar on World War I. In Spring 2022, he taught an upper-level course: History of the American University.
Prior to serving as president at EKU, he was the 15th president of Southern Utah University. Benson also served for five years as the 14th president of Snow College in Ephraim, Utah.
His scholarly work has focused on the development of the research university and its impact on society. Benson’s latest book, Daniel Coit Gilman and the Birth of the American Research University, was released by Johns Hopkins University (JHU) Press in October 2022. He also is the author of Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel and the coauthor of College for the Commonwealth: A Case for Higher Education in American Democracy.
In reviewing Benson’s latest work, former provost and dean of the faculties at Columbia University, Jonathan Cole, Ph.D., wrote: “With the opening of Johns Hopkins University in 1876, a century after Independence, the American research university was born. The force behind the great transformation was Hopkins’ founding president, Daniel Coit Gilman. Until now, too little has been written about Gilman. Now, finally, Michael T. Benson has written the definitive biography of the man who changed our educational paradigm almost single-handedly. Gilman started the revolution. … This book should be read by anyone interested in the history of education and the evolution of American society. You’ll find it a treat to read.”
Benson graduated cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in political science and double minors in English and history from Brigham Young University in 1990. He completed his doctorate in modern history from the University of Oxford (St. Antony’s College) in 1995. He also earned a master’s degree cum laude in nonprofit administration in 2011 from the University of Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business, where he was the recipient of the prestigious Father Theodore Hesburgh Founder’s Award. In August 2021, Benson completed a Master of Liberal Arts from Johns Hopkins University (JHU). He was a visiting professor in the Department of the History of Science and Technology at JHU in 2020.