Leah Barrett

Since January 2020, Wyoming native Dr. Leah A. Barrett has served as the president of Northeast Community College.  

Northeast serves more than 13,000 learners each year in settings such as its 600-acre operating farm; utility lines poles and wind turbines across the state of Nebraska; in nearly 100 high schools; and on its destination campus in Norfolk, Nebraska. For full-time students retention and graduation rates are some of the strongest in the United States as recognized regularly by the Aspen Institute in its top 150 community colleges and being one of the first colleges to receive a multi-million dollar gift from Mackenzie Scott in 2020.  

Barrett is very active in her state serving as the President of Nebraska Statewide Workforce and Education Reporting System, as a commissioner on the Nebraska Information Technology Commission and serving on the board for the Nebraska Diplomats.  Outside of the state she is on the board of directors for the Rural Community College Association and the NASPA Foundation Board.

Prior to leading Northeast, she served as the vice president for student affairs at the Northern Wyoming Community College District. Barrett also served as the associate vice president for enrollment management and student affairs at SUNY Brockport and in college union and student affairs leadership at Boise State University.  Her formative years in higher education included time at Valparaiso University, Arizona State University, and the University of Wyoming.

Barrett holds a Doctor of Education in executive leadership from St. John Fisher College in Rochester, NY and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business administration from the University of Wyoming.