Five Women Appointed to Positions as Deans at Large Universities

Maria Cancian was named the next dean of the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. She will become dean on February 1, 2019. Dr. Cancian currently serves as a professor in the School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. There, she served from 2011 to 2014 as associate dean for fiscal initiatives and social sciences in the College of Letters and Sciences. In 2014, she was named assistant secretary for the administration for Children and Families at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Professor Cancian is a graduate of Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, where she majored in political science and sociology. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan.

Laura D. Tyson was named interim dean of the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. She first joined the faculty at the university in 1977 and served as dean of the business school from 1998 to 2001. From 2002 to 2006, Tyson was dean of the London Business School, the first woman to hold that position. During the Obama administration, Dr. Tyson was chair of the Council of Economic Advisers.

Professor Tyson is a summa cum laude graduate of Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. She earned a Ph.D. in economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Stephanie Woods was appointed dean of the Gayle Greve Hunt School of Nursing at the Texas Tech Health Science Center in El Paso. She has been serving as associate dean of nursing on the Dallas campus of Texas Woman’s University.

Dr. Woods is a graduate of Texas Woman’s University, where she majored in nursing. After serving in the Air Force, Dr. Woods earned a master’s degree at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio and a doctorate at the University of Texas at Austin.

Kit Pogliano was named dean of the Division of Biological Sciences at the University of California, San Diego. She is a professor of molecular biology at the university and has been serving as dean of the Graduate Division. She will be the first woman dean of the Division of Biological Sciences. There are 6,000 undergraduate students majoring in the division at the university.

Dr. Pogliano joined the faculty at the University of California, San Diego in 1996. She holds a Ph.D.  in microbiology and molecular genetics from Harvard Medical School.

Lorraine Frazier was appointed dean of the School of Nursing at Columbia University in New York City. She will also serve as senior vice president of the Columbia University Irving Medical Center. She has been serving as a professor and dean of the School of Nursing at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston. Earlier, she was dean of the College of Nursing at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.

Dr. Frazier is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma. She holds two master’s degrees and a Ph.D. in nursing from the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston.