Fast Facts

WGU is seeking a Regional Regulatory Affairs Advisor with expertise in compliance and regulatory processes within higher education. This role is essential in ensuring institutional compliance across multiple states, enhancing access to education for diverse student populations.

Responsibilities: Monitor state laws and regulations affecting WGU, secure necessary authorizations, manage compliance efforts, and represent the university in strategic meetings.

Skills: Expertise in regulatory environments, strong analytical skills, excellent communication abilities, proficiency in MS Office, and experience in compliance-related roles.

Qualifications: Bachelor's degree and five years of experience in a regulated field, preferably in higher education compliance or accreditation processes.

Location: Home Office, United States of America

Compensation: $66300 - $99500 / Annually

If you’re passionate about building a better future for individuals, communities, and our country—and you’re committed to working hard to play your part in building that future—consider WGU as the next step in your career.

Driven by a mission to expand access to higher education through online, competency-based degree programs, WGU is also committed to being a great place to work for a diverse workforce of student-focused professionals. The university has pioneered a new way to learn in the 21st century, one that has received praise from academic, industry, government, and media leaders. Whatever your role, working for WGU gives you a part to play in helping students graduate, creating a better tomorrow for themselves and their families.

The salary range for this position takes into account the wide range of factors that are considered in making compensation decisions including but not limited to skill sets; experience and training; licensure and certifications; and other business and organizational needs.

At WGU, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their position, and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case. A reasonable estimate of the current range is:

Grade: Professional 307Pay Range: $66,300.00 - $99,500.00

Job Description

Essential Functions and Responsibilities:

• Remains knowledgeable of state laws and regulations; national, state, and professional regulations; and trends within higher education—maintaining a multi-state tracking system to monitor changes which may or will affect WGU’s students and/or operations.
• Secures and maintains state-specific authorization and, when need, other approvals within the region.
• Understands all requirements to obtain state authorization—even if the university utilizes state authorization reciprocity to teach students in a specific jurisdiction.
• Liaises with other university departments to support compliance activities and to provide information about requirements to ensure overall university compliance.
• Manages communications (e.g., complaints and questions) from state portal agents.
• Raises issues with planned changes that require different resourcing or problem solving and participates in addressing the planned changes.
• Applies national, regional, state, and programmatic standards and regulations and rules to determine effects on college, regional, or state operations; raise issues that require different resourcing or problem solving; and coordinate project plans to support departmental initiatives.
• Assures representation of the university at strategic meetings in each jurisdiction, personally attending when defence of WGU’s position is needed.
• Assists with region-specific events that affect the university’s compliance,
• Liaises, as needed, with/for students and/or graduates seeking professional licenses in the region.
• Works with other regional teammates, answering questions using defensible research methodologies.
• Creates and earns the trust of external and internal stakeholders
• Participates in intra- and inter-departmental initiatives.
• Performs other related duties as assigned.

Knowledge, Skill and Abilities:

• Technological competence with MS Office suite (Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, and Office 360) and data collection, analysis, retrieval, and visualization systems
• Basic understanding of descriptive and inferential statistics
• Basic understanding of organizational process strategies
• Able to understand policies, legislative and/or regulatory codes, and standards
• Able to exercise good judgment and effectively organize, prioritize, and perform multiple job functions and conflicting priorities
• Proven capacity to present to large audiences in an engaging manner
• Able to organize travel, when needed, within the region
• Exceptional attention to detail and able to meet all required deadlines
• Able to multi-task and work on multiple projects at the same time
• Able to adapt quickly and easily to changes—whether demanded by internal or external organizations

Competencies:

Organizational Impact:

• Responsible for implementing initiatives and projects established by university or department leadership; establishes operational plans for department, function, or office with short-term impact on results
• May deliver input into new processes, standards, or plans that impact overall university or department results.

Problem Solving & Decision Making:

• Leverages a systems-thinking approach for improving existing processes and systems within the department using significant conceptualizing, reasoning, and interpretation
• Problems and issues faced are numerous, difficult, and require detailed information gathering and analysis. Typically affect multiple areas or specialties. Problems and issues span a wide range of challenging and unique situations

Communication & Influence:

• Collaborates cross-functionally with parties within and outside of the department and may occasionally communicate with external parties
• May influence others to accept the job area’s views, practices, concepts, and approaches and conduct briefings with leaders within the University or department

Leadership & Talent Management

• Responsible for providing guidance, coaching, and training to other employees in the department, Function, or Office
• Provides direction to project team members, including feedback on performance
• Demonstrates the WGU leadership principles in all aspects of service to students, employees, and partners of WGU

Job Qualifications:

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in one of the department’s areas of focus (or a cognate field) from an accredited college or university or equivalency
• Five (5) years’ experience working in a highly regulated environment (e.g., higher education regulation, compliance, accreditation, or quality assurance, working with multiple national, programmatic, and state accreditation and approval bodies. (e.g., state auth boards, state boards of education/educator preparation, state boards of nursing), experience in program approval and/or professional licensing processes with more than one authority, and experience with regulated case management (e.g., student complaints
• Must be located in our South East Region, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, or Mississippi

Preferred Qualifications:

• Additional experience as a licensed professional (e.g., accountant, nurse, teacher—preference given to those in previous roles of leadership within college or university educator preparation programs
• Knowledge of legislative/regulatory procedures in four or more jurisdictions.
• Previous use of change management tracking tools (e.g., State Net, Fiscal Note, web crawlers, etc.)
• Prior training as a quality examiner (Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award preferred)
• Experience presenting to authoritative bodies (e.g., state boards, legislatures, large audiences, etc.)
• Experience writing and shepherding reports through differing approval process
• General knowledge of project management
• Bi-lingual (writing and speaking)

Physical Requirements:

• Prolonged periods sitting at a desk and working on a computer.
• Must be able to lift up to 15 pounds at times.
• NOTE: Travel may occur between 15 and 20% of the time. Occasional work on nights and weekends may be necessary to complete the tasks of this position.

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Position & Application Details

Full-Time Regular Positions (classified as regular and working 40 standard weekly hours): This is a full-time, regular position (classified for 40 standard weekly hours) that is eligible for bonuses; medical, dental, vision, telehealth and mental healthcare; health savings account and flexible spending account; basic and voluntary life insurance; disability coverage; accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity supplemental coverages; legal and identity theft coverage; retirement savings plan; wellbeing program; discounted WGU tuition; and flexible paid time off for rest and relaxation with no need for accrual, flexible paid sick time with no need for accrual, 11 paid holidays, and other paid leaves, including up to 12 weeks of parental leave.

How to Apply: If interested, an application will need to be submitted online. Internal WGU employees will need to apply through the internal job board in Workday.

Additional Information

Disclaimer: The job posting highlights the most critical responsibilities and requirements of the job. It’s not all-inclusive.

Accommodations: Applicants with disabilities who require assistance or accommodation during the application or interview process should contact our Talent Acquisition team at [email protected].

Equal Employment Opportunity: All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to any protected characteristic as required by law.