NewsMakers ’25: Cady Short-Thompson, a dynamic leader on NKU campus, in community

By Laura Kroeger

NKyTribune staff writer

Call it divine providence, prophetic or just plain meant to be. When Cady Short-Thompson was a 27-year-old communications professor at Northern Kentucky University, a colleague pulled her aside. With an aura of assurance he told the high-energy instructor, “some day you are going to be president of NKU.”

The words sunk in and did not leave. At the time she dynamically served as graduate program director and department chair, already in possession of her Bachelor’s, Master’s and Ph.D. from the University of Cincinnati. She carefully watched the leadership styles of various administrators, especially eventual president Dr. Jim Votruba whom she claims, “taught me to be a leader.”

After teaching and moving up in administration at NKU from 1996-2010,