Yale School of Medicine Honors a Pioneering Woman Faculty Member

The Yale School of Medicine has announced the establishment of an endowed professorship to honor the late Carolyn Walsh Slayman. At the time of her death in December 2016, Professor Slayman was the Sterling Professor of Genetics, professor of cellular and molecular physiology, and deputy dean for academic and scientific affairs. Dr. Slayman served on the faculty of the medical school for nearly a half century.

An endowment of $3 million was raised by faculty members, business executives, and physicians to sponsor the professorship to honor Professor Slayman.

After a brief time teaching at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Dr. Slayman joined the faculty at Yale School of Medicine in 1967. She was appointed chair of the department of genetics in 1984, the first woman department chair in school history. In 1995, Dr. Slayman was named deputy dean for scientific and academic affairs at the medical school. She was the first woman to ever be named a deputy dean at the school.

A native of Portland, Maine, Dr. Slayman was a 1958 graduate of Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, where she majored in biology and chemistry. She went on to earn a Ph.D. in biochemical genetics at Rockefeller University in New York. There, she was the only woman in her class.