Minnesota State Board Elects New Chair and Vice Chair

ST. PAUL, Minn., June 17, 2026 – The board of Trustees of the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities has unanimously elected Dawn Erlandson to the role of chair, and Jim Grabowska to the role of vice chair. The chair is elected for one two-year term; the vice chair is elected for one one-year term. Both appointments are effective July 1, 2026.

“I am honored and humbled by the confidence my fellow trustees have placed in me,” said Erlandson. “I look forward to collaborating with them, the leadership of Minnesota State, and our faculty, staff, and students to ensure that Minnesota State, a backbone of Minnesota's economic and civic vitality, continues to provide opportunities for all Minnesotans to create a better future for themselves and their communities.”

A first generation college student, Erlandson has served on the Board of Trustees since 2012, the last two years as vice chair. She is the president of Aurora Strategic Advisors, Inc., where she leads public affairs and marketing communications efforts for local, state, and national clients. She has previously served as chair of the Board of Directors of the Association of Community College Trustees from 2019-2020, chair of UPSTREAM, a national environmental organization, the founding executive director of the Great Plains Institute, market mechanisms coordinator for President Clinton’s Council on Sustainable Development, and as board president of the Minneapolis Community and Technical College Foundation. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Hamline University.

Grabowska has served on the Board of Trustees since 2022. He has been active in different fields of education during most of his career. He taught a variety of subjects in high school here and abroad before moving into higher education, teaching at Gustavus Adolphus College, College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s University, the state university Cuenca, Ecuador, and 23 years of teaching at Minnesota State University, Mankato. He retired from teaching in 2021.

He served in a variety of roles within the faculty union while at MSU, Mankato and as president of the Inter Faculty Organization from 2014-2018. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Northern State University, a master’s from the University of Oklahoma, and a doctorate from the University of Minnesota.

 

Minnesota State includes 26 community and technical colleges and seven state universities serving approximately 270,000 students. It is the third-largest system of two-year colleges and four-year universities in the United States.

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