Bob Glenn is in line to be the next president of Athens State University.

The vice president and vice provost at Middle Tennessee University was selected for the job from 47 other applicants from across the nation.

“They called me late yesterday; my reaction was one of elation,” said Glenn, a one-time University of North Alabama student activities director with 33 years of administrative and leadership experience. “I’m thrilled and pleased to have this opportunity.”

In addition to his professional qualifications, Glenn is the father of a teen-ager, a college student and a college graduate, and a collector of Sherlock Holmes books and memorabilia. He even has a family tie to ASU; his great-grandfather – Edgar Massilon Glenn – was president of ASU from 1902-04 when it was Athens Female College.

“I am both honored and excited to have this opportunity to come back to Alabama and to serve at Athens State University,” said Glenn of Murfreesboro. “I have great respect for the institution and I firmly believe that its best days are ahead of us…”

Bradley Byrne, chancellor of Alabama’s two-year college system, will ask the state board of education Thursday to approve Glenn as president.

“In Dr. Glenn, we have found a rising leader of higher education in the southeast,” Byrne stated in a press release from the Alabama Department of Post Secondary Education.

“He brings a wealth of knowledge and great experience for Athens State as the great-grandson of a former president. As an alumnus of both the University of Alabama and Birmingham-Southern College, he clearly has long-standing ties to our state.”

Glenn will replace Jerry Bartlett who announced Oct. 22, 2007, his intention to retire Aug. 1. Bartlett has served as president since Jan. 1, 1992.

Glenn, who will be 55 in August, has been vice president of student affairs and vice provost for enrollment and academic services at MTSU since Feb. 2002. He began his career in higher education as a residence hall director at B-SC in the fall of 1975. Nine years later, he left the position of director of student services at B-SC to move to the University of North Alabama as director of student activities. From UNA he went to Southwest Missouri State University in 1993 as dean of students. He became vice president for student affairs at MTSU in 1999.

Glenn earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from B-SC, and both a master’s degree in student personnel work and his doctorate degree in counselor education from the University of Alabama.

His wife, Laurie, makes sure the family gets where they need to be and “makes sure I don’t go crazy.” The couple have one son, Carl, a junior in high school; and two daughters, Katie Glenn, a freshman at B-SC who will spend the summer working at a girls camp in Crossville, Tenn.; and Lisa Glenn, a 2006 graduate of BS-C who plans to move to Phoenix in June and work for Teach for America.

If approved by the state board, the Glenns plans to move into the stately, antebellum Beaty House – domain of the ASU president – by Aug. 1.

“I haven’t been in the house, but I understand it is beautiful,” Glenn said.