Dr. Rod Flanigan has spent his entire career successfully building, leading and guiding organizations in industry, education, and non-profits. As a first-generation college student, he spent his early college years going to school and working as a machinist at a small machine shop. The foundational skills and strong work ethic learned in this environment served as the cornerstone of his professional career as he began as a Manufacturing Engineer at McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) working on the Apache Attack Helicopter program. He later transitioned into the fluid power industry where he progressed through increasingly more responsible positions, including Vice President and General Manager of a fluid power distributor. Dr. Flanigan led his business unit through difficult economic conditions and became a top leader in the company, while also guiding and directing other corporate activities such as mergers and acquisitions. It was during this time he earned an MBA from the top ranked Executive MBA program at the University of Utah.

With his unique combination of entrepreneurial skills and proven business acumen, Dr. Flanigan started his own company in 2005. Under Rod's leadership, the company grew quickly and soon became a well-respected power transmission consultant and distribution company in the entire intermountain region (UT, ID, CO, WY). During this same time Rod began his journey through the doctoral process at Utah State University (USU). While managing his growing company, taking doctoral classes, and teaching at USU, Rod was also serving his community as a City Council member. In 2011, the company that Dr. Flanigan founded was sold to a private investor.

After over 25 years working in industry, Dr. Flanigan took his industry experience, and passion to help others, to the classroom and became an Assistant Professor at the University of Nebraska at Kearney (UNK) in the Industrial Distribution program. He quickly advanced to become the Director of the program and using the relationship building skills he had developed in industry began adding industry partners to the program, all of whom provided financial support for the program. Under Dr. Flanigan's leadership the program added student scholarships, established an endowed faculty fund, and continued building laboratory resources through corporate donations. While at UNK, Rod was a governing board member for the Power Transmission Distributors Association Foundation, as well as the Association of Technology, Management, and Applied Engineering (ATMAE), which is the accrediting body for many 2-year and 4-year technical programs in higher education. In 2016, Dr. Flanigan was promoted to Associate professor, and in 2017 he was awarded full tenure within the University of Nebraska system.

Continuing his passion for Career and Technical Education (CTE), Dr. Flanigan accepted the offer to become Dean of Business and Technology (B & T) at Cochise College in 2018. As Dean of B & T, he is responsible for the vision, direction, and leadership of a wide range of programs including, Welding, Cybersecurity, Automotive, Business, Culinary, Building Trades programs, and many others. While at Cochise College Dr. Flanigan and his team have built programs, created novel stackable degrees and certificates, increased enrollment, developed new assessment tools for prior learning (PLA), and pioneered a new instructional modality at the institution.

In addition to his Ph.D. from Utah State University, and MBA from the University of Utah, Dr. Flanigan has a bachelor's degree from Brigham Young University, and an associate's degree from Kishwaukee College. He and his wife are sports enthusiasts, and the proud grandparents of five grandchildren (with one on the way). His greatest source of joy in life is watching his children and grandchildren grow, learn, develop, and find their own path to success.

Dr. Flanigan was appointed to be the 10th President by the North Dakota State Board of Higher Education on March 31, 2022. He officially began his presidential tenure on June 27, 2022.

The mission of the President’s Office is to provide the principled leadership to ensure that as a state agency NDSCS serves the state of North Dakota by attracting, educating, training, developing, graduating and placing individuals into the workforce through our career and technical programs, our transfer programs and our workforce training division by consistently and reliably providing a safe, clean, healthy, green, tech-savvy, affordable and educational environment. 

This office ensures that NDSCS sets and meets high expectations as set forth by department and college accreditation and governing agencies.

This office ensures that resourcefulness, effectiveness and continuous quality improvement is occurring in all areas.

The President oversees the continuous responsive pursuit of academic excellence by fostering partnerships, remaining collaborative, focused and purposeful.

NDSCS has a culture of continuous improvement. The following Quality Standards are part of that culture and guide us in the way we interact with each other and with our customers.

Employee Quality Standards

History of NDSCS - President's Office