Chris Simmons is the Vice President for Government Relations at Duke. He arrived at Duke in 2006 after serving in lead advocacy roles for the Association of American Universities (AAU) and the American Council on Education (ACE) in Washington, DC. Simmons is Duke’s principal point of contact and spokesperson on legislative and regulatory issues involving government relations at the state, federal, and international levels. He also oversees Duke in DC, Duke’s academic center and home for research and official events in Washington, DC.
Prior to working in higher education advocacy, Chris was the policy analyst for the National Commission on the Cost of Higher Education. Before entering the world of higher education politics, he was the Assistant Director of Admissions at Willamette University in Salem, Oregon.
Chris currently serves as the Chair of the Public Issues Committee for the Consortium on Financing Higher Education (COFHE). He is the past Chairman of the Board for the North Carolina Museum of Life and Science and co-chaired the Ad-Hoc Tax Group. Chris is a former member of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) Board of Directors and AAU Council of Federal Relations Steering Committee. He is the inaugural director of the Nakayama Public Service Scholars Program at Duke and serves as an undergraduate academic advisor for the University. For many years he has worked with students in the Shuford Program in Entrepreneurship at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, as a mentor and coach. He is a graduate of the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) Executive Leadership Expedition, and in 2020, Chris was recognized for career excellence and distinguished contributions to national leadership in higher education with the AAU Legacy Award.
Simmons is a graduate of Willamette University where he majored in rhetoric and art. He received his graduate degree from Harvard University.