Michael T. Benson was appointed 15th President of Southern Utah University by the Utah State Board of Regents on November 10, 2006.

In addition to serving as President, Dr. Benson holds the rank of full professor within the Department of Political Science. He has taught at Brigham Young University, the University of Utah, Snow College and SUU in the following areas: international conflict, theories of international relations, comparative politics, American history, the U.S. Presidency and public administration. He has 16 years of administrative experience in higher education with over half that time serving as president. Prior to his tenure at SUU, Michael was the 14th president of Snow College. Age 36 at the time of his appointment, he is the youngest college or university president in the history of the Utah System of Higher Education. Benson is former Chair of the Executive Committee of the Utah State Campus Compact, part of a national coalition of nearly 1,000 college and university presidents representing over five million students committed to fulfilling the civic purposes of higher education. Before his service at Snow, Dr. Benson was a special assistant to the president and secretary to the University of Utah, a cabinet-level position on that campus.

A trained historian with a specialty in the modern Middle East, Benson authored Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel (Praeger), hailed as a landmark work in the area of U.S. foreign policy and presidential history. Dr. Benson's expertise in Middle Eastern history has led to several consulting contracts, including work as an academic advisor and essayist for the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles and serving as a consulting historian and essayist for the Harry S. Truman Library in Independence, Missouri. He is regularly sought after for speaking engagements on the modern Middle East and is a frequent contributor to newspapers and other publications. Given his acumen relative to the region, Dr. Benson leads regular tours to Israel and Egypt and has twice been invited to the United Arab Emirates as a guest of the Chancellor for Higher Education for global conferences and presentations in Abu Dhabi and Dubai. Benson has extensive international experience, having worked and studied abroad for seven years in Italy, England and Israel.

Dr. Benson helped Snow College raise more money in his five year tenure as president than in the previous 117 years of the institution's history combined. The highlight of these efforts was the 2003 dedication of the $19 million Eccles Center for the Performing Arts, the finest facility of its kind in all of central Utah. For his commitment to fine arts generally and to music specifically, the Utah Music Educators Association named Dr. Benson the 2005 "Administrator of the Year." He holds the distinction as the only university or college president ever to have made two different institutions "All Steinway Schools" by securing over $1 million to purchase brand-new instruments for each campus and their respective music departments. A classically-trained pianist, Dr. Benson continues to practice and to perform in various venues. As an avid patron of the arts, Dr. Benson serves on the Board of Governors of the Utah Shakespeare Festival as well as sitting on the Board of Directors of the Utah Humanities Council.

Two weeks into his presidency at SUU, Benson announced the largest pledge ever to a capital facility in the institution's history at that time, $3 million, earmarked for the College of Science. During his first year at SUU, Benson helped the institution secure over $15 million in cash and pledges. He has also directed the development and implementation of SUU's largest and most ambitious comprehensive campaign ever, The Future is Rising, with a goal of over $100 million.

During the 2009 Utah legislative session, Benson was successful in procuring state support for SUU's Science Center — an expanded undergraduate classroom and laboratory complex totaling nearly $20 million in new construction. The project, coupled with a new student housing complex which opened in August 2009, totals $30 million in state funds (including revenue bonds) directed to Southern Utah University for new infrastructure during President Benson's tenure. These state resources for bricks and mortar have been augmented by $6 million in private donations and more than $2 million of federal funds.

Michael is engaged in various community activities as a member of the Cedar City Rotary Club as well as serving on the Board of Advisors for the Cedar City Airport. He is a past member of the Zions Bank Central Utah Board of Advisors and currently serves on the Wells Fargo Southwest Utah Board of Advisors, in addition to being on the Regional Advisory Board for Rocky Mountain Power. He is a member of the Advisory Council at the Center for Policy Analysis, a research component of the American Council on Education (ACE) based in Washington, D.C. Michael also serves on the Presidents' Trust for the Association of American Colleges and Universities. In 2009, Governor Jon M. Huntsman named Benson to the seven-member Utah Appellate Courts Nominating Commission. Utah Business Magazine picked Michael as one of the "40 Under 40" rising stars in Utah in 2003. The January 2011 issue of the magazine listed him among the “100 Most Influential People in Utah.” 

Dr. Benson serves as Chair of the Presidents' Council for the Summit League, SUU's Division I athletic conference whose member institutions stretch from North Dakota to Michigan to Louisiana. During his tenure, the League has added two additional member institutions — the University of South Dakota and the University of Nebraska, Omaha — further expanding its academic and athletic footprint. After two decades of trying, Michael and his associates announced in October 2010 that SUU will join the Big Sky Conference in all sponsored sports beginning in 2012.

An accomplished athlete, Michael has completed several marathons including the Boston Marathon, with his fastest time (2 hours and 41 minutes ) winning his age division in the St. George Marathon and finishing just minutes shy of the qualifying time for the 1984 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. As an undergraduate at Brigham Young University, Michael was a member of the 1988 Junior Varsity Basketball Team. He has also participated in the world's oldest collegiate rivalry, leading the Oxford Blues Basketball Team as a player/coach over Cambridge University in the 1994 Varsity Match. Michael currently maintains a 4 handicap in his favorite sport, golf.