This Women’s History Month, ETSU students do not have to look far for female inspiration.
ETSU’s Provost and Senior Vice President for Academics, Kimberly McCorkle, has experienced many shifts in her life– from practicing law to being an adjunct professor to assuming positions in higher education.
In the summer of 2021, McCorkle was selected from a nationwide search to assume her current position at ETSU. She has found her purpose working in education, a job that allows her to help students shape their futures.
“I say all the time I won the job lottery,” McCorkle said. “There is nothing like having the opportunity to inspire students and help connect students to what they want to become.”
Despite having found education to be her calling, McCorkle originally had her sights set on other career goals. As an undergraduate at Louisiana State University, McCorkle was studying pre-med. She quickly realized that this path wasn’t for her, so she turned to a mentor there for guidance.
She told her mentor, an English professor at LSU, that she wanted to be like him– to get her doctoral degree, study great works of literature and teach English. He advised her, however, to consider law school; his advice was heeded, as McCorkle would go on to graduate from law school at the University of Florida.
Following law school, McCorkle practiced law for almost five years; first as a prosecutor and then as a defense attorney. Although she enjoyed practicing law, she found her calling during this time while also serving as an adjunct professor in the pre-law program at a local college.
As she practiced law, she continued to teach on the side. When a position opened for a legal studies and criminology professor at the local university, she jumped at the idea.
“I became a tenure track professor and left the practice of law because I realized how much I loved teaching,” McCorkle said.
For the next 20 years, McCorkle worked her way up through higher education. She never lost her interest in law; in fact, she has been able to share this passion with her students throughout the years.
“I still connected my students to the legal system, but I just had a way to do that as a faculty member and not as a practitioner,” McCorkle said.
Currently, McCorkle is still a registered member of the Florida Bar Association.
While at ETSU, McCorkle is excited to continue improving the campus and finding ways to make student’s lives better.
“It’s an exciting time to be at ETSU,” McCorkle said. “We’ve had such great success as a university and I want to continue to build on that.”
McCorkle seeks to add to this success with the implementation of new academic programs, like the new brewing and distillation minor and mechatronics engineering major, and the recently updated Quality Enhancement Plan.
The QEP is a student success project that ETSU will focus on for the next five years. McCorkle shared that ETSU has centered this QEP on community engaged learning, to help get students to connect with the community, actively improve it and solve problems.
Having spent so much time of her life as a woman in leadership positions, McCorkle opened up about these adversities.
“When I started practicing law, which was in the 90s… there would be many times when I’d be the only woman in the courtroom,” McCorkle said. “When that happens you just have to be very comfortable and confident in your belief system, in your abilities… and have a good sense of your purpose.”
She adds that these experiences have contributed to the way that she has approached other leadership positions.
“You recognize that you have a great responsibility to represent voices that are not around a table,” McCorkle said. “If I have the privilege of being around the [leadership] table to have an opportunity to make a decision, I want to be able to represent the voices of people who might not be there.”
McCorkle continues to find fulfillment in her work in higher education. In 10 years, she hopes that she will still be working in this field, teaching and making a difference in the lives of her students.
She always urges her students to work to find their calling in life.
“What’s most important is connecting your ‘what’s next’ to what’s most important to you,” McCorkle said. “When you do that and you have a career like mine… you won’t feel like you’re working. You’ll feel like you’re doing what you’re meant to do.”
Her final piece of advice for students is to continue to do good in the world, regardless of the job position you hold.
“It’s important to do well, but it’s more important to do good,” McCorkle said.
