Cross & Crescent

Chicoine is not an uncommon surname if you live in South Dakota. South Dakota’s heritage tracks back to the French Canadians who settled there in the 1800s after moving west from Quebec.

Since that time, dozens of Chocoine’s have graduated from South Dakota State University. One of them was Dr. David L. Chicoine (South Dakota State 1969).

On January 1, 2007, Chicoine returned to his home state from the University of Illinois to become the 19th president of his alma mater, which is located in Brookings, South Dakota.

In addition to his duties as president, he also is a member of the faculty of the economics department.

“I have the opportunity to continue the momentum that was in place and then to continue to raise expectations and achieve the high aspirations that everybody has for this university,” he says about his priorities.

Those priorities also include continuing to achieve more national distinction for the university.

One example is his decision to transition from NCAA Division II athletics to Division I athletics. This decision led to the school’s women’s basketball team qualifying for the WNIT tournament, the first time a transition institution has been invited to participate in post season play.

Opportunity to Return Home

With more than 11,000 students, South Dakota State is a comprehensive undergraduate and graduate institution comprised of nine colleges, including agricultural and biological sciences, engineering, arts and science, pharmacy, and nursing.

“It is exciting to have the chance to come back to an institution from a major, globally respected research university. I’m eager to help realize the aspirations that everybody, including the faculty, students, support groups, alumni, has for State and what it can accomplish.”

Chicoine graduated from South Dakota State with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1969. He went on to earn a Master of Science degree from the University of Delaware, a Master of Arts degree from Western Illinois University, and eventually a doctorate from the University of Illinois.

“I was aggressively recruited to consider this job,” he says. “It was pretty important to have a lot of individuals think that I had the background and the credentials to return to my home state, my alma mater, and be successful as its 19th president.”

Until the end of last year, Chicoine served as Illinois’ senior officer and adviser to the university president and board of trustees on technology commercialization and economic development issues and initiatives.

This included intellectual property management, start-up businesses, and other matters of technology transfer, as well as business and economic development.

Chicoine also previously served as Illinois’ dean of the College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences and as head of the Department of Agricultural Economics.

From Colony to Official Chapter

When Chicoine attended South Dakota State as an undergraduate, the fraternity and sorority system was in its infancy with only two agricultural fraternities, Alpha Gamma Rho and FarmHouse International Fraternity.

As a part of the Lambda Chi Alpha colony’s second class of initiates, Chicoine had the unique and challenging opportunity to evolve a colony into an official chapter.

We had a lot of great brothers who worked really hard toward chartering in the three years I was involved,” he says. “That’s probably the highlight.”

During the colony status, the brothers from nearby University of South Dakota helped with initiation ceremonies and other activities.

“We had a lot of good help from the South Dakota chapter. They were the colonizing unit,” Chicoine says. “It was a really good experience for us.”

Chicoine served as the chapter’s treasurer for two years and was elected president after they achieved chapter status.

“Leadership is an interesting experience,” he says. “One of the keys was to have a great shared vision and ownership by the people that we were recruiting and those who were already in the house.”

He says they were a focused group and shared the same vision at a time when it was needed to move the organization forward from colony status to that of a full fledged chapter.

Rivals and Collaborators

A few years ago while at Illinois, Chicoine bumped into Jim Abbott (South Dakota 1970), a Lambda Chi and president of the University of South Dakota.

“There was something about him that seemed so familiar to me but I couldn’t figure it out,” Abbott says. “I finally realized after reading his biography or something that he had helped found the Lambda Chi Alpha chapter at South Dakota State 40 years ago.”

That’s when Abbott and Chicoine first met.

“Because I was a member of the chapter at South Dakota, we actually helped in founding that chapter,” Abbott says. “So I just thought it was real interesting that you’d have two Lambda Chis (now) at two strong state schools that tend to be rivals.”

Chicoine says he was amazed by Abbott’s memory of their first meeting and he recalls how valuable the help was.

Now that Chicoine is officially in his new position, he and Abbott have a common fraternal bond and interest in wanting to see the success of their respective schools.

“Both Jim and I are committed to providing a leadership style that is focused on helping our faculty and our institutions achieve our high aspirations, and to serve the people of this state. Perhaps if we didn’t have this fraternal background, it would be a bit more challenging for us to collaborate and to partner,” Chicoine says.

The two universities were established in the 1880s with two distinct purposes: South Dakota State as a land grant university and South Dakota focused on law and business.

“We find ourselves in a situation where we are very complementary with our institutions’ respective missions. We have very little duplication and we ought to be able to take advantage of our historical relationships as Lambda Chis and academic leaders — making more of this opportunity than might otherwise be the case,” Chicoine says.

Applying and Teaching Economics

Chicoine is enjoying his unique, two-pronged opportunity to both apply economics as university president while still having the chance to teach economics in the classroom.

“I really enjoy economics, and getting into administration was simply the ability to apply some of the principles and some of the concepts that you study in your own discipline to the actual world of higher education administration,” he says.

He says it is a privilege to be a professor — to teach, educate, and practice something you really like to do.

“I believe it is a privilege to serve in a leadership position in this industry that really is the place where the gateway of opportunities provided to individuals and really creates a prosperous future for the individuals as well as the places that we have responsibility to serve,” he says.