Danielle morgan acosta
2021-2022

Eighty-second ACPA President

Danielle Morgan Acosta, Ph.D. served as the eighty-second president (2021-2022) of ACPA-College Student Educators International. Her goals during her presidency were centered around grounding the association in the power of people during the height of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, centering leaders to make ACPA a source of community, and ensuring the association remained financially sustainable and viable.

A first-generation student from Clark University, with additional degrees from Salem State University, and Florida State University, Dr. Morgan Acosta has several years of experience as a student affairs practitioner within the functional areas of residence life, leadership development, and a student’s first-year experience. She has taught undergraduate courses in leadership and change, facilitated several trainings around leadership, inclusion, systemic change, and student voice, and serves as a trained National Coalition Building Institute facilitator.

Danielle began her involvement with ACPA as a graduate student at Salem State University, applying for a convention scholarship for ACPA07 in Orlando, Florida. Her interest in ACPA served as her first foray into professional associations, marking the beginning of her list of achievements that would soon follow. At the 2007 Convention, she indicated interest in a Newsletter Coordinator Elect position, as well as serving on future convention committees. She reflects on her colleagues and their trust in her leadership skills, many of which tapped her for other ACPA involvement opportunities where she cultivated the strengths she needed to become the eight-second president. 

She was inspired to pursue her presidential candidacy because of what ACPA had given her in her student affairs career. To give back to the association, she knew that ACPA offered something bigger to other practitioners, serving as a place of great strength, professional development, connections, and opportunities that grounded the field of higher education. She is a firm believer that higher education is loosely coupled on purpose so that associations can provide professional opportunities and give people experiences to gather and reflect on their work collaboratively. At the time, serving as a Convention Chair gave her great understanding of the needs of each member of the association, and her willingness to lead during difficult times emerged from there, knowing that ACPA would make a difference in the lives of college students and professionals.

During her presidency, Danielle advocated for the need for the association to act as a grounding agent in the lives of others during the unprecedented times of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. She started out her presidency during the 2021 Virtual Convention and strove to “help people be seen, be heard, which many had not felt on their college campuses.” She worked to advance Association priorities, such as the 100^th anniversary celebration, governance board transformation, embedding decolonization and racial justice in her work while instilling hope within the members of the association. She utilized the several meetings ACPA held, including Governance Board meetings, as a time to reconnect and recharge, while still ensuring the association advanced positively.

When asked to think back on her presidency and how it prepared her for her future professional roles, she states that she “is where she is professionally because of ACPA.” Her presidency taught her how to make difficult decisions in times of political and social unrest, and the way she understands systems of higher education has been greatly influenced by her work in ACPA, regardless of the institution type. Danielle currently serves as the Senior Associate Dean for Student Success at Clark University, and she credits the way she shows up in spaces, engages with campus officials, and the mentorship she gives to others to the skills ACPA has taught her. Because of this role, she understands the enterprise of higher education and the student experience in a much deeper sense, centering love, humanity, and hard work in each of her interactions. When asked to reflect on what ACPA means to her, Danielle had one word to say: “Home.”