2025 AzAIR Keynote Speakers

What’s next? Expanding our neighborhood for learner success.

The summary is: In a Survival Guide for Leaders, Heifetz and Linsky note that when we undertake complex challenges with no evident technical solution, we should never, ever, ever…ever go alone. While we have created strong communities committed to learner access and success, we continue to navigate barriers due to the enduring scourge of poverty and other challenges to further enhance access and completion. So who else do we invite to confront these challenges? What future roles must data, technology, policy, and systems change play in confronting the lingering complex challenges in front of us? And how might we work differently than we ever have before in living our commitment to the access and success of all learners? This talk will offer perspectives and national high impact practices as we approach these questions.

Andrew Quentin Morse, Ph.D., joined Complete College America in April 2025 as Vice President for Development and Strategic Partnerships. In his role, Morse leads CCA’s fundraising initiatives to further enhance CCA’s national impact on policy and practice on postsecondary access and completion. With a career that has spanned five states and Washington, DC, Morse came to CCA ready to advance state and federal-level initiatives through his role.

Prior to CCA, Dr. Morse served as the Vice President for University Relations at Central Washington University. There, he led a comprehensive reorganization of the university’s marketing, branding, and strategic communications functions, leading initiatives that produced year-over-year increases in post-pandemic first-year enrollment. Recognizing that public universities serve as stewards of place, Morse launched an economic development enterprise at CWU, Business and Community Services, responsible for partnering with communities to support a thriving economy and workforce throughout the central Washington region and beyond. Further, Morse partnered with state agencies, school districts, nonprofits, and other key stakeholders to create and implement guaranteed and automated financial aid and admissions processes that greatly reduce the burden that many first-generation and poverty-impacted students face in navigating the

Before CWU, Morse was chief of staff and senior adviser to the president at the University of Northern Iowa. There, Morse led a nationwide initiative to reimagine the federal role in educator preparation, culminating in bicameral legislation known as the EDUCATORS for America Act that boasted more than 40 cosponsors in the previous Congress. Morse also successfully lobbied for $26.5 million in federal appropriations for economic and workforce development projects related to the adoption of robotic and automation technologies across the American manufacturing supply chain. And with state, federal, and philanthropic funding, Dr. Morse successfully launched UNI@Iowa Community Colleges, effectively eliminating education deserts in the State of Iowa through a seamless pathway for place-bound learners to pursue a bachelor’s degree from UNI through their home community college.

Morse has authored policy briefs, book chapters, and journal articles on a variety of higher education policy themes, including state-level accountability policy, human and civil rights issues, and military-connected student access and success, among others.

He holds a Master of Science (M.S.) and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in Higher Education Administration from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, with a concentration in Higher Education Policy. He also earned a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Psychology from the University of Northern Iowa, where he was part of the University Honors Program.

What’s next? Expanding our neighborhood for learner success.

The summary is: In a Survival Guide for Leaders, Heifetz and Linsky note that when we undertake complex challenges with no evident technical solution, we should never, ever, ever…ever go alone. While we have created strong communities committed to learner access and success, we continue to navigate barriers due to the enduring scourge of poverty and other challenges to further enhance access and completion. So who else do we invite to confront these challenges? What future roles must data, technology, policy, and systems change play in confronting the lingering complex challenges in front of us? And how might we work differently than we ever have before in living our commitment to the access and success of all learners? This talk will offer perspectives and national high impact practices as we approach these questions.