Sheri Everts

Sheri Everts is an American academic and educator. She served as the chancellor of Appalachian State University in North Carolina until her resignation on April 15, 2024.

Early life and education
Born and raised in Nebraska, Everts attended elementary school in a one-room schoolhouse. She completed her undergraduate education at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English in 1980. She worked as a high school English teacher in Nebraska and Kansas for several years, later returning to UNL to complete an Master of Arts in literacy education and Doctor of Education.

Career
In 1994, Everts joined the University of Nebraska Omaha as an assistant professor in the Department of Teacher Education. She was made assistant vice-chancellor for academic and student affairs in 2000, associate vice-president in 2003, and interim senior vice-chancellor in 2006. Everts left UNO in 2008 to become provost and vice-president for academic affairs at Illinois State University. She served as interim president from May to August 2013, following the resignation of Alvin Bowman. In March 2014, Everts was announced as the new chancellor of Appalachian State University. She took office in July 2014, and was formally installed April 2015 as the university's first female chancellor.

Under Chancellor Everts' leadership, enrollment at Appalachian State University has grown to more than 21,000 students, which includes the most diverse student body to date in fall 2023, with 19% of the total population being racially and/or ethnically underrepresented students. The university has increased its underrepresented students by 77% and first-year underrepresented students by 117% since 2014. For the university's 2022-23 undergraduate population, about one-third are first-generation students and nearly one-third are students from rural populations.

In November 2021, Everts announced the establishment of the App State Hickory Campus, which opened to students on Aug. 21, 2023. Until Nov. 19, 2021, when the university purchased the former Corning Optical Communications building, Hickory was the largest metropolitan area in North Carolina that did not have a major, public university campus.

Everts led the charge in opening Appalachian State University's Academy at Middle Fork in Walkertown, North Carolina, in 2018, which serves approximately 300 K-5 students with research-based practices. The university opened its second lab school, the App State Academy at Elkin, in 2022, which serves approximately 100 students in second through fourth grades, and is the only UNC System institution to operate two laboratory school programs.

Since joining Appalachian State University in 2014, Chancellor Everts advocated for increases in faculty salaries, with merit-based salary increases provided in 2019 through a reallocation of state funds and across-the-board salary increase for full-time faculty and staff in the 2021–22 and 2022-23 fiscal years thanks to the biennial state budget bill signed into law by North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper on Nov. 18, 2021.

Through the university's Appalachian Energy Summit, UNC System campuses had, by 2023, avoided $1.75 billion in utility costs. In early 2022, the university's percentage of electricity supplied from renewable energy sources increased from 2% to 18%, an advancement made possible through hydroelectric and solar power purchases, and purchased electricity for the Levine Hall of Health Sciences, the university's largest building on its Boone campus, was converted to 100% solar.

In 2020, Everts established the Chancellor's Awards for Inclusive Excellence. The inaugural award honorees included university students, faculty and staff, as well as a local community member.

Everts' two-year term as president of the NCSS Division I Sun Belt Conference, in which 17 of App State's 17 varsity sports teams compete, began July 1, 2023. For the past two years, she served as vice president of the conference.

On April 15, 2024, Everts announced her resignation as Chancellor of App State effective April 19 citing personal health challenges.

Criticism
On August 17, 2020, the Appalachian State Faculty Senate voted no confidence in Chancellor's Everts' leadership because of concerns about teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic. Appalachian State was one of the largest UNC System schools to hold in-person classes throughout 2020, with 30 percent in-person classes, 30 percent hybrid classes and 40 percent remote/online classes.

In Spring of 2024, Sheri Everts faced mounting criticism surrounding her renaming of Pride week to Spring Week as well as discussions around firing and demoting of LGBT+ professors and faculty. This was exacerbated by a poorly received response from student affairs and the discontinuation of the Expression tunnels. Several protests surfaced around the treatment of LGBT+ Appalachian State students, Faculty as well as the failed construction and maintenance of the Wey Hall Art building.