David Boardman is the interim provost of Temple University and the dean of the Klein College of Media and Communication. As a leader in the university community for more than a decade, David’s love and commitment to Temple is profound. While he has chosen not to be a candidate for the permanent position of provost, David is devoted to moving the university forward in his interim role.
Interim Provost David Boardman
As Temple’s chief academic officer, David works with President Fry, other university leaders and faculty to set the academic strategy and vision for the future. His portfolio includes overseeing the university’s 17 schools and colleges and numerous divisions that support the academic mission, faculty affairs, student success, global engagement, and strategic planning, among others.
David has served as dean of the Klein College of Media and Communication since 2013. Over that time, the school has dramatically increased its national profile, its research output and its fundraising. In 2018 and 2022, Temple University Television, an enterprise of the Klein College, was named the nation’s best college television station by the Intercollegiate Broadcasting System. Also in 2022, the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication named David the Administrator of the Year.
Previously, David was a journalist and served as president of the Accrediting Council for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. Immediately before joining Temple, he was executive editor and senior vice president of The Seattle Times, the largest news organization in the Pacific Northwest.
Under his leadership, The Seattle Times won four Pulitzer Prizes and produced 10 Pulitzer finalists. David personally has been the recipient of numerous other major national awards, including the National Ethics Award from the Society of Professional Journalists, the Goldsmith Prize in Investigative Reporting from Harvard University, the Worth Bingham Prize in Investigative Reporting, the Investigative Reporters and Editors Award and the Associated Press Managing Editors Public Service Award.
David remains active in the journalism industry and in the Philadelphia community. He is founding chair of the Lenfest Institute for Journalism, the nonprofit that owns The Philadelphia Inquirer. He also chairs Spotlight PA, a nonprofit news organization focused on public affairs. He is the immediate past chair of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, and is a member of its executive committee. He also serves on the boards of the Solutions Journalism Network, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, and the Metcalf Institute for Environmental Journalism. He also serves on the advisory board of ProPublica.
David also is a past president and board member of Investigative Reporters and Editors and of the American Society of News Editors, and served as chairman of the National Advisory Board of the Poynter Institute for Media Studies. He is a Poynter Ethics Fellow. He is a former member of the Sigma Delta Chi Foundation Board and has served six times as a juror for the Pulitzer Prizes.
David has conducted seminars for journalists in Austria, Belgium, Bosnia, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hong Kong, Israel, The Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, South Africa and Turkey.
Before joining The Seattle Times, David was a reporter and editor at several papers in the Northwest, and worked on a construction project in Liberia, West Africa. He is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and has a graduate degree from the University of Washington. He is an inductee of both the Medill Alumni Hall of Achievement and the University of Washington Communications Hall of Fame.
He has volunteered as a youth basketball coach and has served on advisory boards supporting music and journalism programs in public schools. David has two daughters and he enjoys kayaking, hiking, yoga, reading, cooking, wine, travel, music and cheering on the Temple Owls and Philadelphia’s sports teams, all with his wife, Kate.