SID SALTER • MSU CCO & DIRECTOR OF THE OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS
Sidney L. "Sid" Salter is Chief Communications Officer and Director of the Office of Public Affairs at Mississippi State University.
In that role, he leads a team of marketing and communications professionals in producing award-winning print, broadcast, and digital content designed to advance MSU's reputation as a nationally prominent research university. Salter is also the university's spokesman and the administrator of both the University Television Center and campus radio station WMSV-FM.
MSU's 2004 National Alumnus of the Year, Salter has enjoyed a unique career as an award-winning journalist, columnist, television commentator, talk radio host, author, educator, and university administrator. He was a John C. Stennis Scholar in Political Science as a student at MSU.
The Washington Post has listed him as "one of the nation's best state political reporters." He is a member of the Miss. Press Association's Hall of Fame. His syndicated columns have been published in Mississippi and a number of national newspapers since 1983.
He formerly served as MSU's first journalist-in-residence and was the inaugural holder of the Kelly Gene Cook Chair in Journalism at the University of Mississippi, where he served on the Journalism faculty in the 1990s.
Salter represents MSU on the board of directors of the University Press of Mississippi - the state's academic press - and serves on the Southeastern Conference Communicators Executive Committee. He also serves as vice president of the Pushmataha Area Council, Boy Scouts of America and is president-elect of the Starkville Rotary Club.
He is a member of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) and Counselors to Higher Education, a section within PRSA.
In 2011, Salter wrote the biography of legendary MSU broadcaster Jack Cristil, which funded MSU's Jacob S. "Jack" Cristil Endowed Scholarship.
Salter is a member of the board of directors of Community Bancshares of Mississippi, Inc., a multi-bank holding company operating as Community Bank in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and Florida. He is also a member of the board of directors of the G.V. "Sonny" Montgomery Foundation.
Salter and his wife, Leilani, have four grown children and seven grandchildren. They are members of Starkville's First United Methodist Church.