Six Women Faculty Women Who Are Taking on New Roles in Higher Education

Ana María Martínez will join Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music beginning July 1, 2021, as a professor in the department of voice. Professor Martínez was an artist-in-residence at Rice for the 2019-20 academic year.

A native of San Juan, Puerto Rico, Professor Martinez received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The Juilliard School in New York City.

Gail Wilson, who holds the Sarkeys Distinguished Professorship in Rangeland Soil Ecology in the department of natural resource ecology and management at Oklahoma State University, has been named a Regents Professor, the most prestigious title attainable by university faculty. Regents Professors are those who have made important contributions to their discipline and who are recognized nationally and internationally for their prominence in research, teaching, extension, outreach, or leadership.

Professor Wilson earned her bachelor’s degree in biology with a minor in geology from Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pennsylvania. She holds a master’s degree in biology from Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in agronomy from Kansas State University

Malika Jeffries-EL, an associate professor of chemistry at Boston University, has been given the added duties of associate dean of the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Her research focuses on the development of organic semiconductors and their use in optical and electronic devices. Prior to joining the chemistry faculty at Boston University in 2016, Dr. Jeffries-EL was an associate professor at Iowa State University.

Dr. Jeffries-EL is a graduate of Wellesley College in Massachusetts, where she majored in chemistry and Africana studies. She holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

Shoshana Schechter, an instructor in Bible and director of the Mechinah Pathways Basic Jewish Studies Program at Yeshiva University in New York, has been given the added duties of associate dean for Torah Studies at the university’s Stern College for Women.

Schechter is a graduate of Yeshiva University and holds a master’s degree from Columbia University.

Anne-Marie Schultz, professor of philosophy at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, is one of three scholars to be named a Master Teacher at the school –  the highest honor granted to Baylor faculty members for sustained excellence in teaching. Professor Schultz started her Baylor teaching career as an assistant professor of philosophy in 1993. In 1999, Dr. Schultz became the first female faculty member to receive tenure in the department of philosophy at Baylor. In 2013, she became the first woman in Baylor’s history to receive promotion to full professor of philosophy.

Professor Schultz is a summa cum laude graduate of Trinity University in San Antonio. She earned a Ph.D. at Pennsylvania State University.

J. Camille Hall, a professor in the College of Social Work at the University of Tennessee Knoxville, was given the added duties of the new position of associate dean for equity and inclusion. Dr. Hall joined the faculty at the university in 2004 and serves as a clinical social work officer in the United States Army Reserve.

Dr. Hall holds a bachelor’s degree and a master of social work degree from New Mexico State University. She earned a Ph.D. at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts.