In his 12th year at the helm of the Northern Illinois University Department of Intercollegiate Athletics, Sean T. Frazier has guided the Huskies to historic milestones competitively, academically and socially, cemented his status as both a national and community leader on diversity and inclusion and led successful fundraising efforts that have transformed the student-athlete experience at NIU. 

Frazier’s record of success at NIU has led to national recognition. In 2021-22, he was named a finalist for the Athletic Director of the Year by Sports Business Journal and in 2023, he was recognized by Crain’s Chicago Business as a Notable Leader IN DEI. He currently serves as second vice-president of the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics. In May 2024, Frazier became a “Hall of Famer” as he was inducted into the Suffolk County Sports Hall of Fame on his native Long Island.

With the NIU Convocation Center, the Huskie Marching Band and NIU Recreation added to the NIU Athletics family, Frazier’s influence and leadership extends throughout the campus and community. His work to move not just Huskie Athletics, but Northern Illinois University as a whole, forward, led to his promotion to Vice President/Director of Athletics and Recreation in 2021.

The NIU men’s golf team captured the 2023 Mid-American Conference Championship, their first conference championship since 1985. This win marked the 14th MAC Championship won by Huskie teams during Frazier’s tenure at NIU, the most MAC titles won under the leadership of any athletic administration in school history.

NIU also has produced student-athletes who have achieved at the highest levels both athletically and academically during Frazier’s tenure, including Heisman Trophy finalist Jordan Lynch (2013) and, most recently, All-Americans in football, women’s track and field and wrestling.
 
An emphasis on academic excellence has extended throughout the department. NIU student-athletes finished the 2023-24 academic year with a cumulative GPA of 3.408 (highest of all-time. Every NIU sports program surpassed the Academic Progress Rate for the 16th straight year, and nearly 90 percent of student-athletes who have entered NIU over the last eight years have earned their degrees according to the latest Graduation Success Rate (GSR).
 
Under Frazier, the Huskies have claimed two honors unprecedented in the school’s history. In May 2017, NIU won the Mid-American Conference’s Fred Jacoby Trophy, presented to the top women’s athletic program in the MAC, for the first time. In 2016 and again in 2022, NIU received the NCAA and Minority Opportunities Athletic Association (MOAA) Diversity and Inclusion Award, becoming the only two-time recipient since the inception of the award.

A leader on campus who has served on multiple committees, he has also been involved with diversity, equity and inclusion efforts at the highest level of college athletics. He was recognized as part of Sports Business Journal’s inaugural “ALL IN: Leaders in Diversity and Inclusive Hiring”  in March 2021.
  
Frazier is a past president of MOAA, earning that organization’s Distinguished Service Award in 2014. He has written numerous papers, presented on topics of diversity, leadership and hiring at national meetings and served on many NCAA committees.

A Long Island, N.Y. native, he played four years of college football at the University of Alabama from 1987-91 and was a member of the 1989 SEC Championship team. He earned his bachelor's degree in communications from Alabama and has a master's degree in higher education/educational leadership from the University of Maine.

Frazier and his wife, Rosa, an accomplished lawyer and former law professor, have three children, daughters Marina and Marcella, and son Maximo.