The University of the West Indies (the UWI) recently announced new senior appointments across the university, including that of new campus registrar for the Mona campus, Dr Donovan Stanberry.

The campus registrar is the most senior administrator, serving as chief administrative officer, chief operating officer, and as secretary to all campus committees. At Mona, the registrar’s office has oversight for admissions; campus records management; examinations; human resource management; the international students office; marketing, recruitment and communications; graduate studies and research; registry information systems; and the secretariat.

Dr Stanberry began his professional career in September 1992 as a lecturer of mathematics at the then College of Arts, Science and Technology, having graduated, with honours, from Moscow Agricultural Academy (now Russian State Agrarian University), with a master’s degree in agricultural economics in June 1992.

Two years later he moved to the Planning Institute of Jamaica, assuming the position of senior economist/head of the Agricultural Unit until March 1996, when he was recruited to the then Ministry of Public Utilities and Transport as senior director with responsibility for water. In January 1998 he transferred to the Ministry of Water as senior director, and was subsequently promoted to chief technical director for water in 2000 in the Ministry of Water and Housing.

In November 2004 he was appointed permanent secretary in the Ministry of Land and Environment, before transferring to the Ministry of Agriculture and Lands in April 2006. When the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries was merged with the Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce in March 2016, Dr Stanberry remained permanent secretary until April this year.

Notwithstanding his hectic workload as a senior civil servant, Dr Stanberry completed an MBA from Mona School of Business and Management, with distinction, in 2002, and a doctorate in environmental management also from The UWI, in 2018.

In recognition of his outstanding public service, the Government of Jamaica conferred Dr Stanberry, who is also a justice of the peace, with the Order of Distinction (Commander Class) in 2018.

Dr Stanberry is also a certified teacher of Russian language, and is an elder in the Church of God (Seventh-Day).