Rhonda Butler, InterVarsity’s new director of Black Campus Ministries, comes to her new role with extensive leadership experience both on campus and in the church. Her new position will incorporate both areas of experience in a new way.
A year ago Rhonda was assistant professor of Business and Diversity, and executive director of Entrepreneurship, at Bennett College for Women in Greensboro, N.C. She didn’t know about InterVarsity’s work on campus but she sensed God calling her into full-time ministry. She took a step of faith and told her boss that she was going to be leaving her faculty position.
InterVarsity provides the opportunity
When she learned about the opportunity to lead InterVarsity’s Black Campus Ministries (BCM), she realized that was the opening she was looking for. “I am compelled by the opportunity to impact college and university communities, which I love, in a different and even more significant way than I have done over the last 14 years,” Rhonda said.
Rhonda comes from a family of Baptist preachers and is a licensed preacher. She has served in church leadership roles since her youth and is currently an ordained elder at St. James Presbyterian Church in Greensboro.
The most important lesson
“Working to ensure that all students, faculty, and university staff members have the opportunity to learn of and be transformed by God's love is the most important lesson I could ever offer a campus,” Rhonda said. “It is a compelling task, and I feel blessed to join InterVarsity and BCM in that labor.”
InterVarsity's BCM has 63 staff members and serves 3,133 students from African American, Caribbean, and African national backgrounds. BCM grew 28% over the last two school years.
Rhonda’s husband, Max, is a marketing manager for Volvo Trucks North America, and they live in North Carolina with their three children.
