SUNY names Toale officer-in-charge at SUNY Oswego

OSWEGO, N.Y. — SUNY has appointed Mary Toale officer-in-charge at SUNY Oswego, effective Jan. 1, 2022.

Toale will serve as officer-in-charge at SUNY Oswego while the college searches for a permanent president.

She will assume leadership duties following the Dec. 31 retirement of long-serving school president Deborah Stanley. SUNY on Monday appointed Stanley interim chancellor of the SUNY system, effective on Jan. 15.

Toale has served SUNY Oswego in a number of leadership roles since her arrival in 2014, most recently as deputy to the president, affirmative action officer, and campus safety monitor. She also serves as the liaison to the SUNY employee relations and general counsel’s offices.

She joined SUNY Oswego in 2014 to create and launch the strategic communication graduate program. Toale has been in higher education for more than 25 years, having spent the past 20 years as a faculty member at schools including SUNY Oswego; West Virginia Wesleyan College in Buckhannon, West Virginia; and Baldwin Wallace University in Berea, Ohio, per the news release.

“I have been extremely fortunate to work closely with President Stanley, the dedicated members of our President’s Council, administrators, faculty, staff and students across our campus,” Toale said. “As a first-generation Pell grant recipient, I love SUNY Oswego’s mission and learner-centered focus. I am looking forward to the continued partnerships as the SUNY Oswego community searches for our next president.”

Toale has been deeply involved in and advanced all high-level initiatives of the SUNY Oswego President’s Office. She recently partnered with President Stanley and Rodmon King, the college’s chief diversity and inclusion officer, to create the Institute for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Transformative Practice.

SUNY Oswego’s presidential search committee, led by College Council Chair James McMahon, has already started a national search for a permanent president for the campus. The university is working with SUNY and Academic Search — a Washington, D.C.–based executive-search firm catering to colleges and universities — to recruit prospective candidates, the school said.