“I JUST BECAME VERY ACTIVE IN HER 2020 CAMPAIGN TO THE EXTENT THAT WHEN SHE WAS SELECTED TO BE THE VICE PRESIDENT, ON THE TICKET WITH BIDEN, SHE CALLED ME AND THANKED ME FOR ALL THE WORK I HAD DONE WITH THE DIVINE NINE.” -DR. GLENDA GLOVER
the state level was declining,” said Glover of her decision to retire. By the legislature’s own admission of TSU being historically underfunded, Glover was a vocal critic of the systemic inequities in state funding allocations, consistently advocating for equitable financial support to ensure the university’s long-term sustainability and growth. The U.S. Department of Education concluded that the state of Tennessee owes TSU $2.1 billion. “I had done all that I thought that God had called me to do at Tennessee State University.” In retirement, Glover’s schedule has not been leisurely. She is a past international president of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. and remains very active with her sorority. Glover had a history of supporting Vice
President Kamala Harris prior to her historic 2024 campaign for the President of the United States, “I liked her platform. I liked it when she became senator. I just I looked at her as being just the epitome of what Black women can achieve.” During Harris’s first presidential campaign in 2020, Glover supported her sorority sister’s candidacy, “I just became very active in her 2020 campaign to the extent that when she was selected to be the vice president, on the ticket with Biden, she called me and thanked me for all the work I had done with the Divine Nine.” When Harris became the Democratic Party’s nominee in 2024, Glover joined the campaign by serving as the master coordinator for the HBCU and Divine Nine Initiatives, Glover’s experience as an HBCU leader had a direct correlation
to her duties and responsibilities on the campaign trail, “Having been a college president and knowing the current presidents, it was easier for me to relate to the students and to get them hyped up and ready to engage in voter education and voter participation overall.” She traveled extensively in this role and was a frequent voice advocating for Harris in numerous interviews. Although Glover was not new to the political arena, she still learned lessons from the campaign. She described her takeaways as, “Getting to meet the people and share ideas and working on the strategy was very important to me, because campaigns are won on the strategy and getting out the vote. Those are the skill sets that I brought to the table from having been brought up in a civil rights and political home. My
dad was a manager in several campaigns and was a strong civil rights leader in Memphis.” Now that the election is over, Glover is looking forward to slowing down while remaining active in the HBCU community of leaders and shaping the narrative for the future around funding, “We have to have an eye-opener to let HBCUs know that you’re essentially on your own. There’s nobody you can depend on to fight your battles to raise your money. You’re on your own. There is this fallacy that there are state- supported schools. There’s no such thing. Schools are state assisted, but they are definitely not state supported, and I think that’s a rude awakening to a lot of college presidents. I think that’s what we really need to help them to understand. And in the
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