SALISBURY — Two longtime Catawba College admissions employees, Elaine Holden and Steffanie West, will assume new responsibilities Aug. 1 when Cindy Barr, the current vice president of enrollment, leaves the college.

Their promotions come with Barr’s endorsement and were announced by Catawba President Brien Lewis.

Holden, currently director of admissions, will become vice president of enrollment, responsible for admissions and financial aid. West, currently associate director of admissions operations, will become director of admissions. Both have worked closely with Barr to strengthen Catawba’s enrollment process and say they are committed to continuing to execute strategies now in place.

A Pittsburgh native, Holden joined the staff of Catawba in 1988 in the admissions office, where she worked for nine years. She served an additional year in the alumni and development office. In development, her task was small business development relations and alumni/admissions connections. She was a 1995 graduate of Leadership Rowan.

Holden left Catawba for more than a decade and was a substitute teacher for Rowan-Salisbury Schools. She focused on raising her family and worked with several community-based organizations with youth-related initiatives, including Communities in Schools and Food for Thought.

She returned to Catawba in 2011 as director of admissions. She is active in state, regional and national associations for admissions officers, registrars and college counselors. She has served on Catawba’s SAC-COC quality enhancement plan committee, which implemented the Catawba 2 Career Center and is currently involved in the John N. Gardner Institute’s retention strategic planning as well as the values proposition strategic planning initiatives for the college.

Working closely with Barr, West and Catawba’s IT department has been an integral part of Catawba’s implementation of the common application for the fall 2018 class.

Active in St. John’s Lutheran Church, she continues her involvement in community organizations focused on youth by volunteering with the Rowan County Crosby Scholars program and Communities in Schools mentoring.

Holden earned her bachelor of arts degree in communications with a marketing concentration from Bowling Green State University. While an undergraduate, she interned with the Walt Disney Co. and Bowling Green’s undergraduate admissions offices. She is in the process of completing a master of arts in higher education leadership at Lenoir-Rhyne University and anticipates a May graduation.

Married to Tyler Holden, the two are parents of Shelby, a 2016 graduate of Salisbury High School who is a student at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and David, a junior at Salisbury High School.

Steffanie West

West will make the transition from her role as associate director of admissions operations to director of admissions, replacing Holden. In addition to her continued work overseeing admissions operations, she will soon oversee the full admissions staff and coordinate recruitment efforts for the day program.

West began working for Catawba in January 2011 immediately following her graduation with a bachelor of science degree in business administration with a concentration in management from the college. She has held multiple roles on the admissions staff, including admissions counselor andevent coordinator, as well as extensive work within the operations department of admissions that has included reporting admissions data for the campus and a heavy involvement in the implementation of the admissions customer relations management software.

West has begun her second term as chairwoman of Catawba’s Staff Council. She served between August 2012 and May 2017 as adviser to the Student Government Association.

She is married to Eric West, also a Catawba alumnus who is an instructor in physical education at North Hills Christian School. Together, they are active in their church, leading Bible studies for post-college singles and volunteering with the college ministry.