Airea “Dee” Matthews has been appointed provost of Bryn Mawr College, a women’s liberal arts institution in Pennsylvania. She will serve in the role for a three-and-a-half-year term beginning January 1.
Professor Matthews began her tenure at Bryn Mawr in 2017 as an assistant professor of creative writing and director of the poetry program. She quickly rose through the academic ranks and now serves as a full professor and co-chair of the creative writing program. Additionally, she currently serves as a graduate faculty member with the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Creative Writers in North Carolina. She has previously taught at the University of Michigan and Rutgers University in New Jersey.
As a poet and educator, Professor Matthews centers her work on the intersections of language, economics, race, and social policy. She has penned numerous individual poems and published two poetry collections: Bread and Circus (Scribner, 2023) and Simulacra (Yale University Press, 2017). In recognition of her outstanding work, Professor Matthews has received several honors and fellowships, including a 2024 Guggenheim Fellowship, a 2022 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship, and a 2020 Pew Fellowship in the Arts. From 2022-2023, she was the sixth poet laureate of Philadelphia.
Professor Matthews earned her bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Pennsylvania. She holds both a master of public administration degree and a master of fine arts degree in poetry from the University of Michigan.