Christine Wilkinson brings a lifetime of Sun Devil experience to Alumni Association
By Leigh Flayton

Dr. Christine Kajikawa Wilkinson is what’s known in Hollywood as a multi-hyphenate: Among the myriad titles she’s had during her career at ASU — student-teacher-administrator-athletics director-and more — now she is the president of the Alumni Association, as well as senior vice president and secretary of the university.

Wilkinson may be a business-card printer’s challenge, but she is the Alumni Association’s dream. Her appointment, made last spring by ASU President Michael Crow, has been enthusiastically received and roundly praised.

"It’s been very heartwarming to hear from so many individuals,” Wilkinson says of her appointment, citing the congratulations she’s received from scores of alumni, colleagues, and well-wishers who are happy to have a dyed-in-the-wool Sun Devil in office. With the exception of a few years as a student abroad in Italy and at the University of California at Berkeley, Wilkinson is ASU through and through.

"She is ASU,” says assistant athletic director Mark Brand, who is in his 23rd year with the university. “Her father is Bill Kajikawa, who is known as Mr. Sun Devil. He coached sports teams for 50-60 years — a legend here. Christine grew up around ASU and has worked here her entire life.”

Life at the university certainly has been a family affair, and Wilkinson’s mother, Margaret, was quite the Mrs. Sun Devil. As the assistant vice president of First National Bank, which stood near what is now the ASU Foundation, Wilkinson says Margaret was one of the first people students met upon arriving at school and opening bank accounts or applying for loans. This memory is a proud one for Wilkinson, who revels in the history of her family, as well as the university’s, in her office inside the venerable Old Main building.

"It’s been a wonderful experience of growing up with the university,” she says. “Each evolution has just been stronger; each was built on those who came before.”

Wilkinson has had a striking evolution herself. She has degrees in education and counseling psychology, as well as a philosophy doctorate in higher education administration, and throughout her career, she has administered to myriad aspects of life at ASU. She has been both student and teacher, and she served for 13 years as vice president of student affairs. There, her former colleague in the department and the current vice president of university undergraduate initiatives, James Rund, says Wilkinson was known as the “consummate institutional person.

"She sets self interest aside to advance the university and [aims] only to serve the greater good,” he says.

That service has resulted in Wilkinson being awarded the university’s Award of Merit, the Alumni Achievement Award, and the CASE award for excellence in teaching, among other community honors. In addition to ASU, Wilkinson serves the community-at-large, sitting on a number of boards: St. Joseph’s Hospital Foundation, Arizona Hospital and Healthcare Association, Southwest Autism Research and Resource Center, St. Luke’s Health Initiatives, and the National Board of Governors of the American Red Cross.

Wilkinson also has served as interim athletic director three times. These appointments were a fitting tribute to Mr. Sun Devil’s daughter, who was no slouch in the athletic department herself, lettering in volleyball, softball, tennis, and soccer in high school.

Tom Collins, senior associate athletic director, says Wilkinson helped the athletics department through a challenging time in her third stint as AD. As she was appointed, one football player faced charges in the death of a former player. It was an uneasy time, to say the least, but Collins said Wilkinson made people understand that the issue at hand was a university one and that “football wasn’t by itself.

"She walked into [Coach Koetter’s] office, sat down, and just talked with him,” Collins recalls. “Christine’s got that great ability to go into somebody’s office and make them feel comfortable.” Collins credits her success as a leader to this ability. “Everybody sees it. She’s the vice president of the university, yet she’s at football practice or she’s going down to check on somebody at academic student services, or she’s with a coach to check on the welfare of a student athlete.”

Wilkinson expects her new post at the Alumni Association will be more upbeat than her work last spring in athletics. As president, she will tend to the roughly 290,00 living alumni, and she aims to attract thousands back to their alma mater.

"Our goal is to have alums engage, affiliate, and contribute,” she says. “And we help them engage by providing programs and services that match their needs at particular points throughout their lives.”

Wilkinson cites traditional benefits like discounts, insurance, and credit cards, but says she is currently conducting outreach to determine what else the association can do vis-à-vis the attraction and retention of alumni involvement. She says the Leadership Scholarship Program, which she founded in 1977 while serving as director of admissions, may be seen as a model for the types of plans she has for the association. In addition to scholarships, the program provides mentoring, volunteering, and community-involvement opportunities to about 102 students a year. Rund calls it “a legacy of hers” that will “serve ASU for many years.”

"Alums are not one size fits all,” Wilkinson says, and her ideas have the association’s board chairwoman, Sandra Day, filled with excitement.

"Her selection was a very interesting and insightful one,” says Day. “She is a sincere, motivated, sensitive person who has made a very constructive difference in a lot of people’s lives.” Day credits Wilkinson’s “very unique set of personal attributes and enthusiasm for the mission of public education and specifically ASU” as what will distinguish her tenure.

Collins, Wilkinson’s longtime colleague in athletics, echoed some of those sentiments.

"Christine’s such a treasure for this university because of all the knowledge and the history she has, all the years she’s put in,” he says. “She’s just got so much credibility when she walks into a room.”

Leigh Flayton is a Phoenix-base freelance writer.

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Photo: Dave Tevis

Dr. Christine K. Wilkinson