Georgia Northwestern Technical College President Heidi Popham has been elected to serve on the board of trustees for the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC), the accrediting body for degree-granting higher education institutions across the southern states.

Popham was elected as part of Georgia’s delegation during the 2025 SACSCOC Annual Meeting, held Dec. 6–9 in Nashville, Tennessee. Her three-year term as a trustee begins Jan. 1.

“I am honored to have been elected to serve as a Trustee and am eager to support the Commission’s continued work in ensuring quality, integrity and accountability across our member institutions,” Popham said.

Popham was named GNTC president in 2019 and has spent her career building from within the college. She began at GNTC in 1995 as executive assistant to the president, later becoming director of Institutional Effectiveness in 2007 and vice president of Institutional Effectiveness in 2009. She also served as the college’s accreditation liaison, and in 2016 was promoted to executive vice president before taking the top post.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in Organizational Management from Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, along with a master’s degree and doctoral degree from the University of Georgia.