Seven Women Appointed to Positions as Deans

Kathryn Chval was appointed dean of the College of Education at the University of Missouri at Columbia, effective July 1. She has been serving as acting dean. Before joined the University of Missouri faculty in 2003, Dr. Chval was acting section head for the Teacher Professional Continuum Program at the National Science Foundation.

Professor Chval hold bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in education, all from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

The Washington College of Law at American University in Washington, D.C., has named Camille A. Nelson as its next dean. She will become dean on July 25. Professor Nelson was dean of the Suffolk University Law School in Boston from 2010 to 2015. Earlier, she taught at the Saint Louis University School of Law.

A native of Jamaica, Professor Nelson is a graduate of the University of Toronto and earned a law degree at the University of Ottawa. She also holds a master’s degree in law from Columbia University.

Maria Claudia Tomany was appointed dean of the College of Graduate and Interdisciplinary Studies at North Dakota State University in Fargo, effective May 15. She is the vice provost at St. Xavier University in Chicago. Earlier, Dr. Tomany was dean of graduate studies at Western State Colorado University in Gunnison.

Dr. Tomany is a graduate of the University of Bergen in Norway. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in English and Scandinavian studies from the University of Munich in Germany.

Sandra Witte is the new dean of the Jordan College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology at Fresno State University in California. She has been serving in the post on an interim basis since October 2014. Earlier, she was dean of the Division of Graduate Studies. Dr. Witte joined the faculty at Fresno State in 1992.

Dr. Witte is a graduate of California State Polytechnic University in Pomona. She earned a master’s degree at Fresno State and a Ph.D. in food systems management at Oregon State University.

Barbara E. Wolfe was appointed dean of the College of Nursing at the University of Rhode Island. She has been serving as a professor and associate dean for research at the Connell School of Nursing at Boston College. She also serves as a lecturer in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Wolfe is a nursing graduate of Syracuse University in New York. She holds a master’s degree in psychiatric mental health nursing from Yale University and a Ph.D. in nursing from Boston College.

Kay M. Palan was named dean of the Culverhouse College of Commerce at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, effective July 1. Currently, she serves as dean of the Haworth College of Business at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo. She has held that post since 2010. Earlier, Dr. Palan was associate dean for undergraduate programs at Iowa State University.

Dr. Palan is a graduate of Winoma State University in Minnesota. She holds an MBA from Minnesota State University in Moorhead and a Ph.D. in business from Texas Tech University in Lubbock.

Margaret Raymond was appointed to a new five-year term as dean of the law school at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was named dean in July 2011. From 1995 to 2011, Dean Raymond was a professor of law at the University of Iowa. She served as a clerk to Justice Thurgood Marshall at the U.S. Supreme Court.

Dean Raymond is a graduate of Carleton College and Columbia Law School, where she was editor-in-chief of the Columbia Law Review.