The executive director of the Iowa Board of Regents announced his resignation Monday afternoon, effective Aug. 5, a day after the Regent’s August meeting.

Greg Nichols, who has been with the Board since Feb. 2002, has taken a position at Iowa State as special assistant to ISU President Gregory Geoffroy — Nichols also plans to be a lecturer in the department of education leadership and policy studies.

“Greg has most of his work completed toward his Ph.D., this is an opportunity for him to finish that while working on some statewide education issues, in the context of Iowa State, of great interest to him and all Iowans,” said Barb Boose, communications officer for the Board of Regents.

Nichols said he will assume his role at Iowa State when the fall semester begins on Aug. 22.

“For me, this is a terrific professional opportunity,” he said. “It allows me to do some things that frankly, the demands of this job, the demands of time, would not allow me to do.”

As special assistant to the president, Nichols said he will work on the Regents Tuition Policy Task Force, which is putting together a plan to help keep tuition stable and affordable. He plans to work with Geoffroy on the Iowa Coordinating Council, which helps integrate private and public higher education policy in Iowa.

“I’m also going to be representing him on the group that’s going to be meeting this fall on student retention issues on campus,” Nichols said, adding that he could fill additional roles as well. “Those are three immediate things that I know about, we’ve had some conversations about other areas.”

Nichols said the position at Iowa State will allow him to branch out and build on his past experience.

“I’ve worked in different levels of educational policy making, but never in a campus environment with a university president.”

Nichols said he plans to finish his dissertation, a comparative study of state policy making for higher education, this fall. Although no teaching plans are finalized, he said he hopes to begin lecturing this fall for the education leadership and policy studies department.

“This department does a lot of graduate level seminars for masters and Ph.D. students, particularly in the second half of the year,” Nichols said.

He said he is very excited to be returning to Iowa State, where he met his wife while they were both undergraduates.

“Iowa State has always been a pretty important part of my life. For me, it feels like coming home,” Nichols said.

On his experience at the Board of Regents, Nichols said, “It’s been a fabulous experience, but it’s been a very demanding experience.”

Boose said Gary Steinke, deputy executive director and chief public affairs officer for the board, will replace Nichols as interim executive director until a permanent replacement can be found.

“In the past, the board has conducted both statewide and national searches for the position,” she said. “I’m sure they’ll want to move expeditiously on it.”

Iowa City Regent Bob Downer said no timeline for finding a replacement has been established yet.

“I’m sure that this will be talked about at our meeting next week in Davenport,” he said.

Downer said Nichols’s departure could leave a leadership void, but expressed confidence in the Board office staff.

“There are a lot of other very, very competent people on the staff that can assist in that regard, I think on an interim basis things should move relatively smoothly, this is certainly going to be a major change,” he said.

“I think Greg has brought a lot of expertise and ability to this position, he’s certainly going to be missed.”