Four Black Scholars Appointed to Positions as Deans

George Nnanna is the new dean of the College of Engineering at the University of Texas-Permian Basin. Currently, 450 students are enrolled in petroleum and mechanical engineering programs at the new college. Electrical and chemical engineering programs will be added this coming fall.

Dr. Nnanna hade served on the engineering faculty and was director of the Northwest Water Institute at Purdue University Northwest in Indiana. He is a graduate of Texas Tech University in Lubbock and holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington.

Bridget Terry Long will be the next dean of the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University. She currently serves as the Saris Professor of Education and Economics at the school. Dr. Long joined the faculty at the school in 2000 as an assistant professor and was promoted to full professor in 2009.  She served as academic dean from 2013 to 2017.

Dr. Long is a graduate of Princeton University and holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University.

Thomas LaVeist was appointed dean of the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine at Tulane University in New Orleans. He will also hold the Presidential Chair in Health Equity. Since 2016, he is a professor in the School of Public Health at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.  Earlier, he was on the faculty at School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. LaVeist is a graduate of the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. He earned a doctorate in medical sociology from the University of Michigan.

Clarence Lang, professor and chair of the department of African and African America studies at the University of Kansas, was named interim dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Science at the university. Professor Lang joined the faculty at the university in 2012. He is the author of Grassroots at the Gateway: Class Politics and Black Freedom Struggle in St. Louis, 1936-75 (University of Michigan Press, 2009).

Dr. Lang is a graduate of the University of Missouri. He holds a master’s degree from Southern Illinois at Edwardsville and a Ph.D. in history from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

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  1. Did you forget to mention Dr. Susan Gooden (VCU)?

    Susan Tinsley Gooden is interim dean and professor of public administration and policy at the L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs at Virginia Commonwealth University, past president of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) and fellow of the congressional chartered National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA). Her books include Why Research Methods Matter (2018, in press), Race and Social Equity: A Nervous Area of Government (2014, Routledge) and Cultural Competency for Public Administrators (2012, Routledge), a co-edited volume. Her research on social equity has been published in Public Administration Review, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Administrative Theory and Praxis, State and Local Government Review, Journal of Public Management and Social Policy, Journal of Public Affairs Education, Review of Public Personnel Administration and other journals. Her research has been funded by several organizations, including the Kellogg Foundation, the Smith Richardson Foundation, MDRC, Manhattan Institute for Policy Research and the Russell Sage Foundation.

    Gooden has received several awards and honors, including the Jewel Prestage Pioneer Award (2015); the Messick Scholar, University of Delaware (2015); Service Award, VCU College of Humanities and Sciences (2011-12); and co-recipient, Best Article of the Year Award, Journal of Public Affairs Education (2007).

    She was appointed to the Commission on Peer Review and Accreditation, the accrediting arm of the Network of Associated Schools of Public Policy, Affairs and Administration (NASPAA). She has previously served as an elected member to the national policy council of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management (APPAM). Gooden is a faculty affiliate at Duke University’s Research Network on Racial and Ethnic Inequality. She received a Fulbright Specialist Award to Zayed University, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. In 2016, she was appointed by Governor McAuliffe to the Virginia Community College System board. A native of Martinsville and Henry County, Virginia, she received her Ph.D. from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University in 1996.

    See https://wilder.vcu.edu/people/faculty/susan-gooden-.html

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