Ten Women Scholars Taking on New Faculty Roles at American Universities

Elizabeth Rule was promoted to director of the AT&T Center for Indigenous Politics and Policy at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. She was the assistant director. Dr. Rule, a member of the Chickasaw Nation, also serves as an assistant professor of professional studies.

Dr. Rule received her bachelor’s degree from Yale University and her master’s and doctorate degrees from Brown University.

Brenda Weber was named a Provost Professor at Indiana University in Bloomington. The Provost Professor position, called Chancellor’s Professor when it was created in 1995, honors those who have achieved local, national, and international distinction in both teaching and research/creative activity. Dr. Weber is a professor of gender studies.

Professor Weber is the author of Makeover TV: Selfhood, Citizenship, and Celebrity (Duke University Press, 2009). She holds a Ph.D. from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.

Amoaba Gooden, an associate professor and chair of the department of Pan-African studies at Kent State University in Ohio, has been assigned the added duties of interim vice president for diversity, equity, and inclusion, effective June 1. Dr. Gooden joined the Kent State University faculty in 2006.

Dr. Gooden received bachelor’s and master’s degrees, both in history, from the University of Guelph in Canada. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in African American studies from Temple University in Philadelphia.

Corinne Peek-Asa was named a Distinguished Professor at the University of Iowa. The program began this spring to recognize tenured scholars of national and international distinction who are having a significant positive impact within the state of Iowa and beyond through teaching, research, scholarship, and artistic creation. Dr. Peek-Asa began teaching at the university in 2001. She serves as associate dean for research and professor in the College of Public Health, and is director of the Injury Prevention Research Center and the University of Iowa International Trauma and Violence Research Training Program.

Professor Peek-Asa earned a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from the University of New Mexico. She holds a master of public health degree and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Eletra Gilchrist-Petty was promoted to full professor of communication at the University of Alabama at Huntsville. She joined the faculty at the university as an assistant professor of communication arts in 2008 and subsequently was promoted and earned tenure in 2013.

Professor Gilchrist-Petty received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in communication studies from the University of Alabama and a Ph.D. from the University of Memphis.

Florie Seery has been appointed associate dean and managing director of Yale School of Drama and Yale Repertory Theatre, effective July 1, 2020. She also joins the faculty as an assistant professor of theater management. For the past 15 years, she has been general manager of the Manhattan Theatre Club.

Seery is a graduate of Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts.

Shoshana Schechter has been named the associate dean for Torah studies at the Stern College for Women, a newly inaugurated position on the Beren Campus of Yeshiva University in New York City. Schechter began her career at Yeshiva University in 1998 as an adjunct professor.

Schechter is a graduate of Yeshiva University and holds master’s degrees from the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies and Columbia University School of Journalism, both in New York City.

Juliette Bianco was named director of the Weatherspoon Art Museum at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. She will also teach in the university’s College of Visual and Performing Arts. Since 2013, she has been deputy director of the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire.

Dr. Bianco is a graduate of Dartmouth College. She holds a master’s degree in art history from the University of Chicago and an educational doctorate from Northeastern University in Boston.

Brooke Bauer, who grew up on the Catawba reservation and became the first member of her tribe to receive a Ph.D., has been named co-director of Native American studies at the University of South Carolina-Lancaster. She joined the faculty at the university in 2016.

Dr. Bauer earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Carolina. She earned her Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Sarah Church, professor of physics at Stanford University, will become the Freeman-Thornton Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education at the university, effective June 1. She has been serving as the vice provost for faculty development, teaching, and learning. Dr. Church joined Stanford’s faculty in 1999.

Professor Church holds a bachelor’s degree in natural sciences and a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge in England.