About
Marlee Brockman has directed the AB Office of Belonging & Inclusion since 2023. She is responsible for AB's twelve recognized affinity groups, the AB Climate Survey (administered every other year), AB's faculty & staff inclusive-pedagogy programs, AB's implementation of the 2024–2029 DEI Strategic Plan, and the Storer Scholarship program in coordination with the Office of Advancement.
A native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (with paternal family roots in Baltimore), Brockman holds an Ed.M. in Higher Education and Student Affairs (HESA) from the Penn State College of Education (2018) and a B.A. (cum laude) in Sociology and African American Studies from Howard University (2016). She is a Penn State HESA Distinguished Graduate (2022).
Before AB she spent five years at Howard University's Office of Student Affairs — initially as a HESA fellow, then as a Resident Director, and finally as Assistant Director of the Howard Center for Inclusive Excellence. She came to AB because — as she tells it — "a 1,100-student university that has been doing this work, quietly, since the 1964 Storer transfer is the rare American college that gets to build forward from a heritage of taking this seriously. I wanted to help with that."
Education
- 2018Ed.M., Higher Education & Student Affairs (HESA) — Penn State College of Education.
- 2016B.A., Sociology & African American Studies (cum laude) — Howard University.
- —Certifications: NCBI Diversity Trainer, Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) Qualified Administrator.
Teaching
Brockman teaches the AB first-year mandatory inclusive-community module, a junior-level Hilltop Core elective on race in American higher education, and co-teaches the annual AB faculty inclusive-pedagogy institute.
- AB 112Building the Hilltop Community (Mandatory)A required four-week module in the first-year seminar covering belonging, dignity, the AB community covenant, and the AB Inclusive Pedagogy Framework.
- HC 320Race & American Higher Education (Hilltop Core)A junior-level Hilltop Core elective tracing the history of race, class, and access in American higher education from the founding through the present. Includes a major project drawing on the Storer Reading Room archive.
Practice, Storer Stewardship & Public Voice
Brockman's identity is the practice of belonging at a small institution with a deep heritage. Under her direction the AB Office of Belonging & Inclusion has launched the Storer Lecture series (2024, inaugural lecturer: Dr. Imani Perry of Harvard), administered the most-completed AB Climate Survey in institutional history (74% response rate, Fall 2024), and partnered with the AB Provost to launch the AB Inclusive Pedagogy Faculty Institute (now in its second year).
She is a member of the NASPA Multicultural Knowledge Community, the American College Personnel Association (ACPA), and the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) Inclusive Excellence Special Interest Group.
Selected Publications & Presentations
- 2024"Inheriting a Legacy: Storer College and the AB Belonging Office." Diverse: Issues in Higher Education.
- 2023"The Standing Coffee Hour: A Small Practice for Small Institutions." About Campus.
- 2025Plenary, ACPA Annual Convention, "Belonging Work at the Small College."
Honors & Service
- 2024NASPA Region III Rising Star Award.
- 2024Inaugural Storer Lecturer Hosted (Dr. Imani Perry).
- 2022Penn State HESA Distinguished Graduate Award.
- 2016Howard University Phi Beta Kappa.
Belonging is not the absence of difference. It is the practice of welcoming a stranger every Tuesday morning, and then again every Tuesday morning after that, until your office is the place on campus where the stranger thinks to come.— Marlee Brockman, M.Ed.
Beyond the Classroom
Brockman lives in Philippi with her partner Andrew (a remote graphic designer for an Atlanta-based agency) and their two cats. She is an active member of the Mt. Carmel AME Church in Buckhannon, the unofficial AB coordinator for the annual Black History Month banquet, and the founder of the Hilltop Coffee Hour — a standing Tuesday-morning coffee hour at the Hilltop Cafe open to any AB student.
She is a serious natural-hair stylist (her clients include several AB faculty members) and a competitive amateur Scrabble player.