New Kansas State registrar Kelley Brundage never planned to pursue her line of work — she said it’s not something you can major in. It just kind of happened to her.
“I was working at Arizona State University,” Brundage said. “The registrar called and asked if I would consider being an assistant registrar, and the next thing you know, you just are in there and find your calling.”
In the process of moving to Manhattan, Brundage plans to start work at K-State on Jan. 13. She finished working the same role at the University of West Florida last Friday.
She said K-State is in a great town with great people, and being apart of K-State’s next chapter excites her.
“Coming to a land grant school was one of the things I was looking for,” Brundage said. “I’m really looking forward to working with the new administration and the office as a whole.”
Through her career so far, Brundage worked at three universities: the University of West Florida, Colorado State and Arizona State.
“My dad was military when I was younger,” she said. “So, we did move a lot. Moving doesn’t necessarily bother me, and I think that’s kind of part of the nature of our career path is to find that next thing, or we have have to move or do something a little different.”
One of her favorite aspects of the job is that the office happens to be the “hidden hub of the university.”
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“We enforce all of the policies and procedures — federal, state, what the university comes up with,” Brundage said. “We make sure systems run and that things are successful for students way beyond registration and grades.”
“Although sometimes it can be challenging, but [I] definitely enjoy the aspect of the support we get to do, and it’s definitely a support mechanism that not everybody’s familiar with,” Brundage added.
While a group of people from around campus made up the hiring committee, Provost Charles Taber made the final hiring decision.
“We were very fortunate to have a strong pool of candidates, and Kelley Brundage emerged as the strong consensus top candidate,” Taber said. “She also was an excellent fit for our student-focused culture.”
Karen Goos, vice provost of enrollment management, will be Brundage’s direct supervisor. While they haven’t met in person, Goos interacted with Brundage via email.
While a registrar needs to work with student records and process data, they must also do right by students and be collaborative. Goos said Brundage has the unique combination of these qualities.
“My understanding is, and what I’ve experienced so far, is that she’s very collaborative,” Goos said. “She’s really knowledgeable and really personable.”
Brundage said she always looks for a way to do things differently.
“My industry, and there’s quite a few of us, we were known for a very long time as kind of being the know people because we have to do so much policy and procedure,” Brundage said. “That’s what keeps me going, being able to look at it differently and finding a placement institution that’s really looking at, ‘How can we do things differently for the benefit of students and faculty and staff?’ That’s kind of my area of expertise.”
