Dr. James B. Martin, Ph.D

Dean of Academics Dr. James B. Martin, Ph.D

January 2017 – June 30, 2021

Dr. James (Jim) B. Martin was appointed the Dean of Academics at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College on 1 August 2016. This appointment followed a ten-year span during which Dr. Martin served as the Associate Dean of Academics at the Staff College, with responsibility for the day-to-day academic operations of the College. He has since been appointed to also serve as the Chief Academic Officer of Army University.

Dr. Martin was commissioned into the Infantry in 1975 after completing his B.A. in Political Science at the University of Kentucky. After successive assignments in the Panama Canal Zone, Ft. Leonard Wood, and Rock Island Arsenal he attended advanced civil schooling at The University of Texas in Austin. While in Austin, Dr. Martin completed an M.A. in American History and followed that educational opportunity with a three-year tour in the Department of History at the United States Military Academy. Following this tour, he was reassigned to Germany and deployed with the U.S. VII Corps to Desert Storm/Shield. After a teaching tour on the faculty of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Dr. Martin deployed to Korea and served a tour as the Deputy Commanding Officer of the 501th Corps Support Group supporting the 2nd Infantry Division area. His return assignment to the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College was to teach in the Combat Studies Institute and in 1997, he was awarded his Ph.D. in American History from The University of Texas at Austin. He retired from the Army that year and entered the civilian academic world.

During his time in the civilian academic world, Dr. Martin led organizations at both Baker University and Friends University. His final position before returning to the Army was as the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs at Friends University. In 2005, Dr. Martin returned to the faculty of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College and in October 2006 was named as the first Associate Dean of the College.

Dr. Martin has spent the past 17 years as a regional accreditor for the Higher Learning Commission, a regional accrediting body, and currently serves on one of its two decision-making bodies. He also serves periodically as a member of the Executive Committee for the J7’s Program for the Accreditation of Joint Education. He is the author of two books in the field of American History and numerous book chapters and articles on history and adult education. He is a frequent speaker in professional military education circles and in the civilian accelerated education world. He has worked extensively with foreign staff colleges in capacity building programs in the Middle East and Africa.