Biography

Dr. Cleo Samudzi is the Managing Director and founder of Ed-Prep Consulting, an educational consulting firm based in Columbia (MO).  Ed-Prep Consulting provides educational services to K-12 and higher education institutions.  It also provides educational services directly to individual high school and college students.

Prior to this, Dr. Samudzi served as Dean of Missouri Academy at Northwest Missouri State University from February 2004 through May 2018.  He was also the Founding Director of the Honors Program at Northwest (March 2005 – May 2008).  Before joining the Northwest, Dr. Samudzi served at the Missouri Department of Higher Education (August 1998 – January 2004) – with key responsibilities in three areas.  First, as Senior Associate for Academic Affairs and Planning, he oversaw academic program evaluation – the evaluation of existing degree and certificate programs, new degree and certificate programs, and degree and certificate program changes, submitted to the Missouri Department of Higher Education by colleges and universities in Missouri.  Second, Dr. Samudzi served as the Commissioner’s Associate for Life Sciences at the Missouri Department of Higher Education.  In this capacity, he worked closely with the commissioner of higher education in providing information and coordinating the state’s life science initiatives.  Third, Dr. Samudzi was Missouri’s Director of the higher education component of the Title II federally funded Improving Teacher Quality Professional Development Program (formerly known as the Eisenhower Program).

Before joining the Missouri Department of Higher Education, Dr. Samudzi was an Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and Chemistry at the University of Missouri-Columbia, Missouri (1993-1998), and Associate Scientist in Molecular Pharmacology at the National Cancer Institute in Frederick, Maryland (1989-1993).  He has also served as a part-time Adjunct Professor of Physics at Shepherd University – a 4-year public regional university in Shepherdstown, West Virginia (1991-1992), and a part-time Biology and Chemistry Instructor at the Community College for Allegheny County in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (1983-1989).

Dr. Samudzi received his B.A. (cum laude) in Biology and Chemistry from Dakota Wesleyan University in Mitchell, South Dakota (1980), and his Master of Science degree (1983) and doctorate (PhD) degree (1990) in biological sciences/x-ray crystallography from the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Dr. Samudzi is married to Dr. Fungai Chanetsa. They have two grown children (one male and one female).  Dr. Samudzi enjoys playing, coaching and watching the world’s greatest sport – fùtbol (a.k.a. soccer)!  He was the head soccer coach of a competitive soccer club in Maryville (MO) – the Maryville Twisters Soccer Club which he founded in Maryville in spring 2005.