Melissa Lawrence Promoted to Director of Students for USU Tooele

TOOELE, Utah — Melissa Kroff Lawrence has been promoted to be Director of Students for the Utah State University Tooele Region. Lawrence assumes this new position after serving as the campus’ first-ever Student Success coordinator, a position she held since 2021. Lawrence officially took on the role on June 21.

"Melissa has been an invaluable member of the USU Tooele team for many years,” said Jennifer Cowburn, associate vice president for USU Tooele. “We are very excited to see her in this new role as Director of Students. As a student herself, she has the unique ability to see things from a staff and student perspective. Melissa is a master at implementing policy, procedure and change to enhance the student experience. We are very fortunate to have her assume this role and look forward to a very exciting future."

Lawrence has been employed at USU since 2014, serving in various positions in Tooele, first as a part-time facilitator and then as a testing center proctor. This led Lawrence to take on the role of testing center coordinator and then her previous position as Student Success coordinator. In all these roles, Lawrence has enjoyed interacting with and making connections with students, faculty, administrators, community members and more. Lawrence hopes to continue this as she starts in this new position, both with local students and leadership and also with statewide leadership.

“In any realm, be it student, parent, neighbor, administrator or friend - good strong connections lead to feelings of inclusion and support; then amazing things get done,” Lawrence said. “People surprise themselves and contribute positively to those around them. In every position I’ve held, I have sought out and created connections not only with our campus’ students, staff and faculty, but also with statewide leadership and counterparts.”

Lawrence is also no stranger to academics in Tooele. She graduated from Tooele High School and then returned to school as a post-traditional student in 2013. Lawrence graduated with both an Associate and Bachelor of Science degree from USU Tooele in Natural Resource Management and is currently working on a master’s degree in Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences.

Entering this new position, Lawrence is excited to serve the students of USU Tooele and to support the great work she already sees from her coworkers, many of which she has worked with for her entire time at USU. Lawrence is ready to continue the positive trajectory she sees at USU.

“I consider myself fortunate that this small but powerful team has been working together in student services for years– nearly a decade,” Lawrence said. “We have experience supporting each other and know how each other operates. We have had opportunities to develop trust, comradery and collectively, we possess an impressive variety of skillsets. I see this as a support position– not just for our students– but for Teresa in advising, Mike in recruiting, Kellie in concurrent, Doni in testing and Kathy as our office manager.”

In her spare time, Lawrence loves to gather memories in the outdoors, going on road trips and hiking through Utah and its bordering states, and spending time with her teenage son.