Karla Leeper says she has always been fascinated with words.
Consider this little ditty from TV she amazed grownups by reciting as a precocious 4-year-old: “Dirt can’t hide from intensified Tide.”
Today, this self-described odd kid holds a PhD and a master’s degree in communication studies, as well an MBA, and has joined the University of Tennessee Health Science Center as the new vice chancellor for Strategic Communications and Marketing.
“I was very verbal, very early,” Dr. Leeper says. “I’m not sure my parents knew quite what to do with me. I was 4 or 5 and I loved all the language and television commercials, and I watched the news. I would walk around reciting the tongue-twister jingles to neighbors or whoever would listen.”
She was also very interested in what was going on in the world. On Tuesdays, which were news days in kindergarten when the children had to bring in a news story and talk about it, her contributions were not the usual kids’ stuff. “I was fixated on Henry Kissinger and the peace talks in the Middle East. I’m 5, and so that’s what I always wanted to talk about.”
She thinks Kissinger’s voice was the attraction. “I liked to hear him,” Dr. Leeper says. “Very early, I was interested in language and reading and what people were saying and what difference it was making.”
That interest in the power of words influenced her education and her eventual career.
A native of Des Moines, Iowa, Dr. Leeper earned a bachelor’s degree in speech communication and political science from the University of Iowa. “When I finished my undergrad, I thought I was going to be a lawyer, so I went to law school,” she says. “But then I wasn’t excited about that.”
Teaching, she discovered, was another story.
“I got the opportunity to teach, and really got excited about that,” Dr. Leeper says. “Most of the classes I taught were sort of, how do the things we say build communities, change minds, further agendas.
“I was a debater in high school and college, and I was just very fascinated by how do you get people to think about an issue differently or change their mind? And how have we historically done that?”
Dr. Leeper was a teaching assistant, first in the College of Communication at the University of Texas, and then in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Kansas. From 1992 to 2006, she taught in the Department of Communication Studies at Baylor University, eventually becoming the department chair.
Public speaking, rhetoric, argumentation, and debate and their role in storytelling represent the through line in Dr. Leeper’s progression through graduate studies, teaching, and into administrative roles.
“I think fundamentally, we understand the world through stories,” she says. “As I went through my graduate study and had some time to think about all these things, I really got focused on the idea of stories and how do all these things that we say and do in and of themselves create stories, and how do they also build a bigger narrative of who we are as a country? You know, at a university, who are we as a university? What are our goals and values, and how do the things that we do every day fit into the story of who we think we are?”
These questions have shaped her career, which has included high-level executive positions in communications and academic health care at several institutions.
Most recently, Dr. Leeper served as the vice chancellor for Strategic Communication and Public Affairs at the University of Kansas.
She previously was the executive vice president for Operations at Augusta University/Augusta University Health, overseeing the Divisions of Marketing and Communication, Auxiliary Services, Facilities, and Human Resources. She also served as the executive vice president for Strategic Communication and Chief Marketing Officer for Augusta University/Augusta University Health System, executive vice president for University Relations, and chief of staff to the president and CEO of Augusta University (formerly Georgia Regents University/Georgia Regents Health System). Additionally, she was the vice president of Executive Affairs and chief of staff to the president of Baylor University.
“I love being part of universities,” Dr. Leeper says. “I love the life of the mind and all the interesting things that happen on campuses. There are things that happen on a campus that don’t happen anywhere else. I love to show up at presentations. I love going to the Graduate Research Days, because you always hear something interesting there. I’m a very, very curious person, and I love hearing speakers and presentations and doing all that.”
And be warned, she loves to ask questions.
“Please don’t take offense,” she says. “This was trained into me from the time that I was in the eighth grade. I asked 100 million questions and there really is no agenda. I’m truly just curious. At first, it kind of freaks people out, because they think I’m trying to play gotcha or something. And that is not it. I really just want to know.”
She says she is excited to get to know UT Health Science Center, as well as her new city and state. She and her husband, John Cleavelin, a retired theatrical designer, have settled in Millington, where they can have land for pets and hobbies.
“I’m a very simple person, but I would say I like to be engaged with the campus and the community and the place where I live,” Dr. Leeper says. “When we go somewhere, we really get involved in the place. And I’ve chosen to go to places where I felt like I would have a great quality of life.”