Barwick was CEO of CBD Associates, LLC, a real estate holding company in New York, and CFO for The Well-Dressed Reader, an internet specialty company. Barwick was Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of Institutional Advancement at
Alfred State College, Executive Director of that college's Development Fund, and held a number of other administrative positions there. From 2008 to 2018, Barwick was certified by CFRE International, a provider of professional certification of fundraising proficiency. Since 2007, he has worked primarily as a fundraiser for nonprofit organizations, raising over $100M since that time. Since 2018, Barwick has published a blog on higher education issues from a senior leadership perspective, The Mortarboard Blog. He hosts a companion podcast, The Mortarboard. Barwick played a minor role as himself in the 2018 and 2019 seasons of the
Netflix documentary series
Last Chance U, which featured Independence Community College. Barwick resigned as President of Independence Community College, he took on the role of president of the Mortarboard which was becoming a larger organization. In 2020, Barwick became Director of Development of the School of Health and Human Services at
Indiana State University. In his first two years at the university, Indiana State University achieved its highest ever university-wide fundraising totals, as well as its highest totals for the health sciences. In 2022, Barwick became the Director of Philanthropy for the
University of Missouri–Kansas City School of Dentistry, and Executive Director of the Rinehart Foundation. He also has periodically taught philosophy as an adjunct instructor for a variety of schools. Barwick is the author of the 2020 book
Risk and Reward: How Small Colleges Get Better Against the Odds, published by ABJames. He is also the author of the 1994 book
Intentional Implications: The impact of a reduction of mind on philosophy, published by
University Press of America. According to
WorldCat, the book is held in 95 libraries. In 2023, Barwick was arrested in Independence, Kansas for allegedly committing theft. Following an investigation, the charges were dismissed.
President of Independence Community College He became President of
Independence Community College in 2011, serving in that role until June 2019. Barwick was named by Ingram's Business Magazine as one of the "Fifty Kansans You Should Know" in 2016. In 2017, he was elected President of the Council of Presidents, the Kansas-wide group of community college presidents. During the 2017-2018 fiscal year in which he represented Kansas Community Colleges, community college funding statewide received its first increase in eight years. Active in Rotary International, he became the president of the Independence, Kansas Rotary Club in 2017. In 2013, Independence Community College became the first public college in Kansas to allow the concealed carry of handguns. As more states require public colleges to allow concealed carry, Barwick has spoken and published on the data gathered during the period since the rule was enacted, the process used to construct his campus' policy, and the insurance options for schools who choose to allow concealed carry. In 2016, Barwick was one of eight presidents who threatened to leave the
Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference over concerns regarding football roster limitations. Barwick and the seven other presidents argued that the roster limitations were originally based on racial discrimination, and continued to have a discriminatory effect against minority athletes. The conference subsequently voted unanimously to eliminate the restrictions. ==Views==