< Previous40 AUBURN UNIVERSITY AUBURNTIGERS.COM Auburn University is a comprehen- sive land-, sea- and space-grant institu- tion with a renowned history of pioneer- ing research, life-changing outreach and innovative instruction. Auburn students, graduates and faculty transform the fruits of the university’s research and scholarship, becoming problem solvers and thought leaders. More than 33,000 students are en- rolled on the picturesque, 1,841-acre campus known as “The Loveliest Village on the Plains.” Throughout the years, the institution has had four official names: East Alabama Male College (1856-72), Agricultural and Mechanical College (1872-99), Alabama Polytechnic Insti- tute (1899-1960) and Auburn University (1960-present). Students can choose from more than 175 majors in 12 colleges at the under- graduate and graduate levels. Auburn has awarded some 315,000 degrees in everything from agriculture to zoology. The university provides real-world learning laboratories where students can gain experience and leadership principles, better preparing them to compete in the marketplace and make meaningful contributions to society. When students arrive on campus, they find more than 600 clubs and organiza- tions to discover, enriching their educa- tional experience outside the classroom. In addition to societal impact, Auburn makes a $6.3 billion yearly economic im- pact in the state of Alabama and is des- ignated as an Innovation and Economic Prosperity University by the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities. Auburn is led by President Christo- pher B. Roberts, who began his appoint- ment as its 21st president in May 2022. Roberts began his tenure at Auburn as an assistant professor in the Depart- ment of Chemical Engineering and became the department chair in 2003. Roberts served as the dean of Auburn’s Samuel Ginn College of Engineering from 2012-22. Generations of alumni have been propelled to success by their Auburn education. The list of accomplished alumni includes the CEO of Apple, the founders of Habitat for Humanity and Wikipedia, an Oscar-winning actress, many sports legends and six astronauts. Auburn alumni make up a worldwide network of about 250,000-strong. The Auburn Alumni Association has more than 35,000 life members and contrib- utes to a significant number of scholar- ships, professorships and faculty awards each year. The Black Alumni Council and Young Alumni Council, as well as more than 100 Auburn Clubs and Affil- iate Groups throughout the country, are dedicated to ensuring all Auburn alumni and friends are meaningfully connected back to their institution. Tigers Who Yell “War Eagle!” Aubie the Tiger is the university’s mascot, and all Auburn athletic teams are nicknamed the Tigers. “War Ea- gle” is the battle cry. For more than 100 years, eagles have been associated with Auburn’s football program, and, since 2000, an eagle has flown above the crowds before home football games. To the Auburn Family, it’s very simple: They are the Tigers who yell “War Eagle!” Auburn retired its famed golden ea- gle Nova, War Eagle VII, in November 2019 and named golden eagle Aurea as War Eagle VIII. Aurea, now a 10-year- old female, is Auburn’s eighth official War Eagle to carry on the storied tra- dition of golden eagles at Auburn foot- ball games. The Auburn University Raptor Cen- ter, a division of Auburn’s College of Veterinary Medicine, also flies a bald eagle, Independence, at home games. Better known as Indy, Auburn’s new- est eagle made her Auburn pre-game flight debut during the 2021 football season. The center’s mission is to re- habilitate and release injured and or- phaned raptors, to educate the public about their role and importance and to research raptor-related issues. All birds used in the educational pro- grams, including pregame flights, are non-releasable due to injury or human imprinting. AUBURN UNIVERSITY: MAKING A SOCIETAL IMPACT Samford Hall, Auburn University42 BOARD OF TRUSTEES AUBURNTIGERS.COM BOB DUMAS (Auburn) Retired Banking Executive Third District - Lee WAYNE T. SMITH (Nashville, Tenn.) Healthcare Executive At Large ZEKE SMITH (Birmingham) Utility Executive At Large CLARK SAHLIE (Montgomery) Business Executive Second District JAMES H. SANFORD (Prattville) Agriculture Executive Vice President Pro Tempore Fourth District WILLIAM P. AINSWORTH (Guntersville) Retired Transportation Executive Fifth District ELIZABETH HUNTLEY (Clanton) Attorney Sixth District JAMES W. RANE (Abbeville) Business Executive Third District CAROLINE MCDONALD ADERHOLT (Haleyville) Nonprofit Executive Seventh District MICHAEL A. DEMAIORIBUS (Huntsville) Retired Technology Executive Eighth District JAMES PRATT (Birmingham) Attorney Ninth District WALT WOLTOSZ (Auburn) Chairman, Simulations Plus Inc. At Large GOV. KAY IVEY President (Ex-officio) B.T. ROBERTS (Mobile) Commercial Real Estate Executive First District QUENTIN P. RIGGINS (Birmingham) Utility Executive President Pro Tempore At Large TIMOTHY VINES (Birmingham) Healthcare Insurance Executive At Large SHERRI M. WILLIAMS Deputy Board Secretary JON G. WAGGONER Board SecretaryOPEN YOUR HEART, OPEN YOUR HOME. Brighten the life of a foster child forever. Over 5,700 Alabama children and youth are currently in foster care. For some, their stay lasts only a few days. Others need foster care until they are adopted or reunited with their biological families. All of these children share a need for caring, committed families who can give them the future they deserve. Take the first steps to become a foster or adoptive parent by visiting dhr.alabama.gov or by scanning the QR code above. ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN RESOURCES44 UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT AUBURNTIGERS.COM Christopher B. Roberts began his ap- pointment as Auburn University’s 21st president in May 2022. President Roberts leads the univer- sity’s four divisions, including Auburn’s main campus with its more than 33,000 students and 6,500 faculty and staff, as well as Auburn University at Montgom- ery, the Alabama Cooperative Extension System and the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station, a joint enterprise with Alabama A&M University. Roberts is an accomplished scholar who under- stands that research and teaching excel- lence, together with service and public engagement, are at the very heart of the state’s R1 land-, sea- and space-grant institution. The R1 designation in the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education recognizes Auburn as a top-level research institution. As the university’s CEO, Roberts marshals the institution’s $1.6 billion annual budget and vast resources, while spearheading the university’s strategic vision and ad- vancing Auburn’s ever-growing research enterprise and economic development. Prior to his presidency, Roberts served as the dean of Auburn’s Samuel Ginn College of Engineering from 2012 to 2022. The college has more than 6,000 students and about 500 faculty and staff members. Roberts was a factor in the success of the university’s Because This is Auburn — A Campaign for Auburn University, which raised $1.2 billion. Under Roberts’ leadership, more than $357 million in dona- tions to the college were made during and since the campaign. He earned a bachelor’s degree in chemical engi- neering from the Univer- sity of Missouri and mas- ter’s and doctoral degrees in chemical engineering from the University of Notre Dame. He began his career at Auburn in 1994 as an assistant pro- fessor in the Department of Chemical Engineering and became department chair in 2003. He also served as the George E. and Dorothy Stafford Uth- laut Professor of Chemical Engineering. He has a strong record of scholarly and academic achievement in nanotechnology and synthetic fu- els. Roberts has published close to 150 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters in leading chemical engineer- ing, chemistry, materials and related journals and has given over 300 con- ference presentations, invited seminars and lectures. He has received 45 re- search grants and contracts from gov- ernment agencies and corporations, such as the National Science Founda- tion, U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Defense, the USDA- Agriculture and Food Research Initia- tive and Boeing. He has been honored with numer- ous awards for his accomplishments and contributions to the field of en- gineering. Some of those recogni- tions include the University of Notre Dame’s Graduate School Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2015; the Univer- sity of Missouri’s Chemical Engineer- ing Academy of Distinguished Alumni in 2014; the National Organization of Black Chemists and Chemical Engi- neers President’s Award for Fostering Minority Engagement in 2012; and the SEC Academic Consortium Faculty Achievement Award in 2012. He and his wife, Tracy, have two chil- dren and enjoy cheering on Auburn’s national championship-winning Division 1 athletics programs. DR. CHRISTOPHER B. ROBERTS, PRESIDENT46 DIRECTOR OF ATHLETICS AUBURNTIGERS.COM John Cohen, who has more than two decades of experience as a coach and administrator in the Southeastern Con- ference, was named the 16th Director of Athletics at Auburn University on Oct. 31, 2022. Cohen spent the previous 14 years at Mississippi State in various ca- pacities, most recently as the athletic director from 2016-22. Cohen hit the ground running in his role as Auburn’s athletic director as he immediately conducted an extensive search for a new head football coach and ultimately named Hugh Freeze to the role on Nov. 28, 2022, less than a month after Cohen arrived on the Plains. Throughout Cohen’s first 20 months at Auburn, athletics programs have achieved tremendous success, high- lighted by men’s golf winning the 2024 national championship, the 23rd nation- al championship in the history of Auburn Athletics, as well as a pair of national run- ner-up finishes from men’s track & field (2024) and equestrian (2023). Twenty of 21 programs have advanced to their respective NCAA postseason tourna- ments under Cohen’s leadership. Cohen has also played a major role in determining the final details of Plains- man Park’s ongoing $30 million expan- sion and renovation project as well as the approval of the Jordan-Hare Stadium north endzone videoboard expansion, among other facilities projects. Cohen’s career in college athletics began as a baseball player at Mississippi State before entering the coaching ranks for 25 years. A two-time SEC Coach of the Year, he was named MSU’s director of athletics on November 4, 2016, and led the Bulldog program to record-breaking success athletically, academically and in capital project campaigns. Athletically, Cohen oversaw argu- ably the greatest era in Bulldog history, highlighted by a 2021 College World Series Championship – the school’s first team national title in any sport. A to- tal of five Bulldog programs turned in a program-best season with Cohen at the helm of the department, including soft- ball (2022), baseball (2021), volleyball (2021), soccer (2018) and women’s bas- ketball (2017, 2018). After beginning his stint as the head baseball coach at MSU in July 2008, Co- hen’s official role in administration be- gan in 2016 when he assumed the role of associate athletic director in addition to head baseball coach. As the head coach at MSU, Cohen led the Bulldogs to the 2013 College World Series finals, a SEC regular season championship and a SEC Tournament title. In the classroom, 133 of his play- ers were named to the SEC Academic Honor Roll, including three straight SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year winners from 2013-15. As a baseball player for the Bulldogs, Cohen was a key member of the 1989 SEC Champion and 1990 College World Series teams. He graduated from MSU with a degree in English and earned a master’s degree in sports management from Missouri. Prior to becoming the head coach at MSU, Cohen’s coaching career includ- ed assistant coaching stops at Missouri (1992-97) and Florida (2002-03) and head coaching stops at Northwest- ern State (1998-2001) and Kentucky (2004-08). Along with winning 284 games as a head coach at MSU, 138 of Cohen’s players were selected in the Major League Baseball Draft, and numerous assistants, including Auburn’s Butch Thompson, are now or have been SEC head coaches. Cohen is one of just two individu- als who have played, coached and later served as director of athletics for a pro- gram participating in the College World Series. He is the only coach in SEC histo- ry to win a SEC championship, SEC Tour- nament title, and advance to the College World Series both as a player and head coach. Click here for more on JOHN COHEN JOHN COHEN DIRECTOR OF ATHLETICScrush YOUR THIRST, crush THE OPPONENT PROUD PARTNER OF AUBURN ATHLETICS WAR EAGLE48 THROUGH THE LENS: KENTUCKY AUBURNTIGERS.COM THROUGH THE LENSPlease visit our website at www.vcom.edu/outcomes for a copy of our Outcomes Report. ©2024 Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine. All rights reserved. www.vcom.edu to become a physician? The Auburn campus of the Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine was created with a clear purpose to alleviate the physician shortage in Alabama. VCOM-Auburn constantly works to recruit students from rural and underserved areas. It is our hope that they will return home to serve their community and improve health outcomes across the state. Visit us online to find out how we are inspired to make a difference in our communities and beyond.Next >