Janet Simon Schreck is vice provost for academic affairs and innovation at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. An associate professor in the School of Education, Dr. Schreck has held administrative roles in the provost’s office since 2015. Prior to her new position, she was senior associate vice provost for academic affairs. Her current scholarly work centers on innovation in higher education, including curriculum development, learning assessment, advising, and credentialing.
Dr. Schreck received her bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in speech-language pathology from Loyola University Maryland and her Ph.D. in gerontology from the University of Maryland, Baltimore.
Tessa Warren was named a provost faculty fellow at the University of Pittsburgh, where she teaches as a professor in the department of psychology with affiliate appointments in the departments of linguistics and communication science and disorders. Dr. Warren also serves as a senior scientist at Pitt’s Learning Research & Development Center. Drawing from insights in linguistics and cognitive psychology, her research examines how readers and listeners construct meaning from language in context.
Dr. Warren is a graduate of Yale University, where she majored in cognitive psychology. She earned a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in brain and cognitive sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Hala Nassar, professor of landscape architecture at Clemson University in South Carolina, was appointed chair-elect of the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture’s Academy of Fellows. At Clemson, Dr. Nassar serves as director of the master’s degree program in landscape architecture. In her new role, she will serve a three-year term working with national colleagues to advance the landscape architecture profession.
Dr. Nassar holds a bachelor’s degree, two master’s degrees, and a Ph.D., all from Ain Shams University in Cairo, Egypt.
Lindsay Shea has been appointed director of the Center for State Health Policy at Rutgers University’s Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research. She comes to Rutgers from Drexel University in Philadelphia, where she is an associate professor and director of the Policy Analytics Center at the A.J. Drexel Autism Institute. Her research focuses on informing physical and mental health improvements and addressing disabilities across the lifespan among people with complex needs. In addition to her leadership role at Rutgers, Dr. Shea will hold a faculty appointment in the department of psychiatry in the Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.
Dr. Shea is a graduate of Susquehanna University in Pennsylvania, where she majored in psychology. She holds a master’s degree in social policy from the University of Pennsylvania and a doctor of public health degree in health policy and social justice from Drexel University.
Julia Laskin has been named a distinguished professor of chemistry at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. She first joined the Purdue faculty in 2017 as the William F. and Patty J. Miller Professor of Analytic Chemistry. Her research focuses on the development of unique mass spectrometry instrumentation and on advancing the fundamental understanding of the physical and chemical phenomena underlying chemical analysis of complex molecules in complex mixtures. Before coming to Purdue, Dr. Laskin conducted research with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.
Dr. Laskin earned a master’s degree from Leningrad Polytechnic Institute (now Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University) in Russia and a Ph.D. from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Felicity Newell is a new assistant professor with Texas A&M AgriLife Research and the department of ecology and conservation biology in the Texas A&M University College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. She previously held research appointments at Louisiana State University, the Florida Museum of Natural History, and the University of Bern in Switzerland. As an ecologist, Dr. Newell studies how ecological communities respond to variability in rainfall, hydrology, habitat structure, and land-use history.
Dr. Newell is a graduate of Chatham University in Pittsburgh, where she double-majored in biology and English. She holds a master’s degree in wildlife ecology from Ohio State University and a Ph.D. in zoology from the University of Florida.
Maria Yang has been named vice provost for faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Yang joined the MIT faculty in 2007 and currently holds the title of William E. Leonhard Professor in the department of mechanical engineering. Throughout her tenure, she has served in several leadership roles within the School of Engineering, including associate dean, deputy dean, and interim dean. An internationally recognized leader in design theory and methodology, Dr. Yang studies the early-stage processes used to create successful designs for everything from consumer products to large-scale engineering systems.
Dr. Yang earned her bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from MIT and her master’s degree and Ph.D. in the design division of the mechanical engineering department at Stanford University in California.