Dr. Annette Parker, President, South Central College

Dr. Annette Parker is the President of South Central College, a Minnesota State community and technical college. She has been involved in manufacturing industry and workforce education for more than 35 years. She started her career at General Motors in Lansing, Michigan and moved into education first as a faculty member and administrator at Lansing Community College and later as System Director of Workforce Education for the Kentucky Community and Technical College System. In this role, she also served as Executive Director and Principal Investigator of the Automotive Manufacturing Technical Education Collaborative (AMTEC), a National Science Foundation Advanced Automotive Manufacturing Center of Excellence, which was selected by the National Governors Association as the 2011 Best Practice. 

Dr. Parker has served on President Obama’s Advanced Manufacturing Partnership (AMP) Steering Committee 2.0 and co-chaired AMP’s “Demand-Driven Workforce Development” work team. She has also sat on the Boards of Directors for the American Association of Community Colleges, National Coalition of Advanced Technology Centers, Center for Quality People and Organizations, and Corporate Voices for Working Families, as well as the SkillsUSA Corporate Board and National Career Pathways Network Advisory Board. She currently serves on the Council for Adult and Experiencial Learning Advisory Council (Chair), National Academy of Sciences Roundtable on Systemic Change in Undergraduate STEM Education, Center for Occupational Research and Development (Vice Chair), and Iowa-Minnesota Campus Compact Board of Directors (Chair of MNCC and Vice Chair of IAMNCC).