Five Women in New Administrative Posts in Higher Education

Lisa Lapin was promoted to vice president for university communications at Stanford University in California. Since 2008, she has been the associate vice president for university communications. Earlier in her career, Lapin was the chief communications officer at the University of California, Davis.

Lapin is a graduate of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, where she majored in print journalism. She holds a master’s degree from Stanford University.

Laura E. Martin-Fedich was appointed vice president for enrollment management at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington. She will begin her new job on January 17. Martin-Fedich has been serving as vice president for enrollment and dean of admission and financial aid at Agnes Scott College in Decatur, Georgia.

Martin-Fedich holds a bachelor’s degree in public relations, and a master of public administration degree from Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo.

Gisele Litalien was named associate director of the Center for Research on Families at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. She was the director of the Northfield Mount Hermon Upward Bound program.

Litalien holds a bachelor’s degree in performance from the Berklee College of Music and a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Smith College. She earned a master of social work degree from Springfield College in Massachusetts.

Krystyna Varnado was appointed associate vice president for human resources at the University of Southern Mississippi. She has served as a human resources officer at Mississippi Power Company and the Garden Park Medical Center in Gulfport, Mississippi.

Varnado holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology and an MBA from the University of Southern Mississippi.

Heather Mechler is the new interim director of the Office of Institutional Analytics at the University of New Mexico. She had been serving as associate director of the office since 2015.

Dr. Mechler holds a bachelor’s degree in music and a Ph.D. in educational psychology from the University of Alabama.