Attorney Dean Colson, partner at Coral Gables-based law firm Colson Hicks Eidson, has been elected unanimously chair of the board of governors of the State University System of Florida, a 17-member board responsible for the management of Florida’s State University System. His term will begin in January 2012.
“I am honored to be chosen to lead the Board of Governors and look forward to carrying out its mission with my fellow board members through these challenging times,” Colson said.
“We have more than 320,000 students in the State University System and it is important that we continue our commitment and constitutional responsibility to ensure the system has the resources it needs to serve and prepare them for the economy of tomorrow.”
Colson previously served as vice chair of the board of governors and as chair of its Legislative Committee. He is a past chair of the University of Miami Board of Trustees and chaired the school’s billion dollar capital campaign. Colson later served as a special advisor on higher education to Florida Gov. Charlie Crist.
Colson has more than 30 years of leadership experience in various civic and community roles. He is a past chair of the Florida Supreme Court Judicial Nominating Commission and a former member of Florida’s Commission on Ethics. He is a past president of the Orange Bowl Committee and was chair of the 1995 Super Bowl XXIX Host Committee.
Colson graduated magna cum laude from the University of Miami School of Law, after earning a bachelor’s degree from Princeton University. He served as a law clerk for the Hon. Peter T. Fay, United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, and in 1980 served as a law clerk to Justice William H. Rehnquist of the Supreme Court of the United States.
