Carey Mays • Austin, TX
Strategic Thinking
Is My Moat.
I design campus systems that make student belonging measurable, scalable, and hard to replicate.
Director of Student Involvement & Belonging • St. Edward's University
Carey Mays • Austin, TX
I design campus systems that make student belonging measurable, scalable, and hard to replicate.
Director of Student Involvement & Belonging • St. Edward's University
How I Think
I don't just run campus programs. I build the systems that make programs matter. My work starts with outcomes and works backward: What does belonging actually look like? What does data tell us that intuition misses? What infrastructure needs to exist before any event can succeed? That's the question I've been answering for 17 years.
Most people see the festival, the ceremony, the orientation weekend. I see the system underneath it: the stakeholder alignment that took six months, the data model that proved the ROI, the budget restructure that freed up $112K without cutting a single program. The visible work is only possible because of the invisible architecture.
That approach has carried me through five promotions across two major institutions, from coordinating Greek life at the University of Florida to leading two departments at St. Edward's University. Along the way I earned a PMP, a Tableau certification, two Master's degrees, and something harder to credential: a reputation for making complex, cross-functional work actually work.
The Evidence
17+
Years in Higher Ed
5
Promotions Earned
$1M+
Budget Oversight
300+
Events Annually
55%
Engagement Growth
PMP
Certified
How I Work
Programs, budgets, and timelines are built around what success looks like, not what we've always done. Before I plan a single event, I define what winning means and reverse-engineer the path to get there.
Numbers identify the problem. Narrative creates the will to solve it. I built a tracking system that proved co-curricular involvement correlates with GPA and retention, then used that story to change how my institution invests in Student Affairs.
The thing most people see, the festival, the ceremony, the orientation, is only possible because of the system underneath it. I spend time on budget models, stakeholder maps, and process design because that's where durability lives.
Sustainable change in higher education requires alignment across offices. I spent six months building relationships before I asked anyone to change anything when I proposed the Experience St. Ed's co-curriculum. Three of six cabinet members endorsed it.
Featured Work
Every project below started with a question, not a task list. The outcomes matter, but so does the thinking that produced them. Here is what I saw, what I decided, and why it worked.
Data & Assessment
Strategic Context
The institution had no way to connect co-curricular participation to retention data. I identified that gap as a strategic lever, not just for programming decisions, but for making the case to leadership that Student Affairs deserved investment. The tracking system was the answer to a budget argument, not just an attendance question.
Outcomes
1,428 Students Tracked 49.8% Population Reach National Case StudyCo-Curricular Innovation
Strategic Context
The co-curricular experience had no shared language or framework across campus. I saw that as a positioning problem: if we couldn't articulate the value of what students experience outside the classroom, we couldn't protect it in budget conversations. I built a coalition of 12+ campus partners before presenting a single slide, because alignment had to come before advocacy.
Outcomes
12+ Campus Partners 3 Cabinet Endorsements Theory-to-Practice ModelSignature Event
Strategic Context
Homecoming had become a series of disconnected events without a unifying strategy. I restructured it as a single signature experience co-led with University Advancement, creating shared ownership that tied student programming to alumni engagement and donor relations. The event became a revenue-generating tradition, not just a cost center.
Outcomes
810+ Attendees 113 Alumni 20% Attendance GrowthStudent Transitions
Strategic Context
When COVID-19 hit, the instinct was to replicate the two-day in-person orientation online. I saw a different opportunity: a summer-long engagement model that gave us more touchpoints to identify at-risk students before they ever arrived on campus. The constraint of losing two staff members forced a smarter design, not a smaller one.
Outcomes
100% Retention Virtual Pivot Business Process RedesignLarge-Scale Production
Strategic Context
The campus lacked a unifying cultural moment that could draw all segments of the community together. I designed HillFest not as a concert with add-ons, but as a campus-wide platform with a sponsorship model that made it financially sustainable. The goal was an event the institution couldn't imagine not having.
Outcomes
3,000+ Attendees Campus-Wide Reach Multi-Sponsor RevenueDEI & Belonging
Strategic Context
Belonging initiatives often live in one office and struggle to gain institutional traction. By co-chairing a presidential advisory council rather than running a departmental program, I positioned belonging as an institutional priority with executive sponsorship. The structure matters as much as the programming.
Outcomes
Presidential Advisory Role Institutional DEI StrategyRisk Management
Strategic Context
Traditional hazing prevention training addresses symptoms but not the cultural infrastructure that enables harm. I built a framework that engaged alumni alongside active members, because organizational accountability doesn't work when the people with the most influence aren't in the room.
Outcomes
Multi-Chapter Reach Alumni + Student ModelResume
Seventeen years of strategic leadership in higher education. Five promotions. Two institutions. One consistent approach: start with the outcome and build backward.
Download Resume (PDF)Professional Journey
2025 – Present
St. Edward's University • Austin, TX
Expanded portfolio to lead two departments covering the full spectrum of co-curricular engagement, diversity programming, and campus community building. Serve on the Student Affairs Leadership Team with strategic oversight contributing to the $7+ million divisional budget. Supervise professional staff and 60+ student employees across both offices.
2020 – 2024
St. Edward's University • Austin, TX
Led the formal merger of Student Activities and Student Transitions into a single department, producing 10% fiscal savings and $112K in annual resource reductions while increasing attendance by 24%. Oversaw 70+ direct events and 300+ student organization events annually. Grew student engagement from 32% to 49.8% of the active student population.
2018 – 2020
St. Edward's University • Austin, TX
Promoted to lead a second department concurrently, adding orientation, family engagement, and new student transitions to the existing student activities portfolio. Launched the Family Engagement plan and Peer Mentor initiative.
2016 – 2018
St. Edward's University • Austin, TX
Promoted to lead Student Activities with oversight of student organizations, the University Programming Board, and cultural heritage programming. Managed $256K annual budget while building new alumni engagement revenue streams.
2013 – 2016
St. Edward's University • Austin, TX
Initial hire. Built student activities infrastructure from the ground up. Managed 80+ student organizations. Designed a tracking initiative that tripled special event attendance.
2011 – 2013
University of Florida • Gainesville, FL
Oversaw campus-wide event operations at one of the nation's largest public universities. Advised Student Government Productions ($700K) and ACCENT Speakers Bureau ($500K). Managed permitting for 7,000+ events per year.
2008 – 2011
University of Florida • Gainesville, FL
Supported one of the largest Greek communities in the nation with 90 organizations. Co-taught a for-credit recruitment leadership course for 60+ students. Increased formal recruitment by 10% and informal recruitment by 50%.
Leadership & Service
Active member serving as President, Historian, and Webmaster of the Mu Xi Chapter and as Chaplain and Assistant Undergraduate Advisor for the Mu Gamma Lambda Chapter. A lifelong commitment to brotherhood, scholarship, and service.
Co-chair of the Presidents Advisory Council for Belonging and Community at St. Edward's, championing institutional diversity, equity, and inclusion priorities and advising university leadership on belonging initiatives.
Volunteer Program Cohort Coordinator coaching participants through technology training curriculum, supporting workforce development and digital literacy in underrepresented communities in Austin.
Active member of NASPA, AFA, and ACPA, contributing to the field through conference presentations and committee service at the Southeastern Greek Leadership Summit and institutions across the Southeast.
Presented on cultural Greek organizations, risk management, bystander behavior, and technology in student engagement at regional and national conferences.
PMP, Google Project Management Certificate, Tableau Author Certification, CliftonStrengths Facilitator. Top 5: Adaptability, Relator, Connectedness, Responsibility, Ideation.
In Action
Work With Me
I speak on the strategic and structural challenges that student affairs leaders face, drawing on 17 years of building systems, not just programs, at institutions of different sizes and missions.
I am open to advisory conversations with institutions navigating student engagement strategy, DEI infrastructure, large-scale event design, or departmental restructuring. If you are working through a challenge where systems thinking would help, I would welcome the conversation.
Get in Touch
Whether you are exploring a leadership opportunity, planning a speaking engagement, or navigating a strategic challenge where a fresh perspective would help, I would welcome the conversation.