Former OU Online Vice President Gregg Garn, who has taken on a new role in the athletic department as deputy athletic director of performance excellence, gave updates regarding his new role and OU Online’s future.
In August, OU Athletics announced Garn’s role as deputy athletic director of performance excellence, a new position within the department. Garn served as OU Online vice president for six years.
In an email to OU Daily, Garn wrote he was motivated to move to the new role after helping build strategies concerning name, image and likeness, antitrust matters and other issues that impacted college athletics on the national scale as faculty athletic representative, a position he was first appointed to in 2017.
Garn wrote his role is focused on improving the student athlete experience and welfare.
“My role is focused on student-athlete well-being, academics, the student-athlete experience and preparing our 550 student-athletes for life after sports,” Garn wrote. “I’m also focused on developing a strategic plan to navigate our environmental changes and ensuring OU Athletics continues to perform as one of the top athletics departments in the country.”
Garn said OU Online has now moved under the Office of the Senior Vice President and Provost. Previously OU Online directly reported to the president’s office. OU Online’s service elements, such as marketing, recruiting and instructional design, have moved into OU Education Services, led by CEO Sanam Raza.
“OU Online will continue to thrive. Oklahoma is widely acknowledged as the regional leader in online education. … With well over 4,000 students enrolled in online programs, the new structure of the Provost’s office leading the academic elements and OUES providing the service elements will allow OU Online to move from a regional to a national leader by 2030,” Garn wrote.
OU Online is the university’s digital learning platform and provides students with various undergraduate and graduate courses. There are eight undergraduate programs, including healthcare management, business administration and construction management. There are 46 total graduate programs offered.
In January 2024, the OU Board of Regents approved enhancements to OU Online allowing the university to use OU Education Services, a nonprofit organization, to support OU in managing online programs and courses to improve accessibility.
The university's recent development of OU Online has been part of OU President Joseph Harroz Jr.’s long term goal to join the Association of American Universities, an organization of top research universities that is invitation only. According to the organization, 69 American universities have membership.
Schools within the Southeastern Conference and the Association of American Universities include the University of Texas, Texas A&M University, Vanderbilt University and the University of Florida
Before his role with OU Online, Garn served as dean of the College of Education from 2012 to 2020, after acting as the college’s interim dean for nearly a year. From 2022 to June 2024, Garn served as interim dean of Professional and Continuing Studies alongside his role with OU Online after Martha Banz stepped down in December 2022.
This story was edited by Ana Barboza and Peggy Dodd. Sophie Hemker copy edited this story.
