A Trio of Women Scholars Who Have Been Appointed to Lead Their Academic Departments

Stephanie Yates, the Regions Institute for Financial Education Endowed Professor in the School of Business at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, has been named chair of the department of accounting and finance. Dr. Yates joined the faculty at the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 2007 from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, where she served as a clinical assistant professor.

Dr. Yates earned a bachelor’s degree in marketing, an MBA in accounting, and a master’s degree in international economics from the University of Cincinnati. She holds a Ph.D. in finance from Louisiana State University.

Susan Polster is the new head of the department of journalism and communication at Utah State University. Polster is the first department head to teach at a location other than the flagship campus in Logan. She has been a professor at the USU Eastern campus in Price since 2010.

Dr. Polster holds a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in instructional technology from the University of Utah. She earned a Ph.D. in adult education and technology at the University of Wyoming.

Tracey A. Milligan has been named chair of the department of neurology at New York Medical College in Valhalla, New York. She was an associate professor at Harvard Medical School and distinguished clinician and vice chair for education in the department of neurology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

Dr. Milligan earned her bachelor’s degree in communication disorders at the University of New Mexico. She holds a master’s degree in speech-language pathology from Emerson College in Boston and and earned her medical degree at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in The Bronx, New York.