Ana Patterson
Southwestern Adventist University
26th President
Ana Patterson was a high school student the first time she heard about
Southwestern Adventist University. A New Yorker of Chilean-Italian
descent, she moved to Texas to attend the university she now presides.
“Education played a strong role in my life from the time that I was a child,”
she says. “Both of my parents pushed me in that direction. My father worked for
the New York City board of education as a guidance counselor so I was around
education my entire life.”
She completed both of her degrees at SWAU, and while completing her
MBA, a professor lit a spark in her. “The professor talked to me about possibly
teaching and higher education in the future and really it was that professor who
helped me to think about a career in higher education,” she shares. “I started as
an adjunct instructor. That is what got me on the path to teaching because I fell
in love with the classroom and the interaction with the students.”
Before pursuing her MBA, Patterson was an entrepreneur, owning a family
construction company, and applied that knowledge, from running a business to
the classroom. This experience allowed her to connect with her students.
“I was able to really talk to my students about what life was actually like in
the business world and bring examples from my experiences to them,” she
shares.
Patterson taught for seven years. In 2019 she was named Special Assistant
to the President, and in 2021, she was unanimously chosen as the first Latina
and woman President.
“Ana Patterson is the epitome of both competence and humility. Her
passion and love for both the university and its students and their continued
success made her the ideal candidate for the role of president. We thank God
for his leadership in the selection process, and we know the university is in
good hands because it’s in God’s hands,” says Carlos J. Craig, chair of the
Southwestern Adventist University board of trustees and president of the
Southwestern Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists.
She has been an active member of the community surrounding the
university for the past two decades, acting as a board member for several
organizations serving children and as president of the Children’s Advocacy
Center of Johnson County’s board of directors.
While she has faced setbacks on her journey, Patterson sees them
differently. “I wouldn't call them obstacles. I like to take any obstacle and see the
opportunity,” she says. “The decisions that I had to make are very similar to
decisions that most women with careers have to make, and those are decisions
that have to do with your family, like life-work balance.”
LS
Photos courtesy of Ana Patterson and Southwestern Adventist University.
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President Ana Patterson with students.
18 www.latinastyle.com LATINAStyle V ol. 27, No. 5, 2021
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