New deans to lead Yale College, the Graduate School, and (for the first time) the FAS

May 21, 2014

From left, Tamar Gendler, dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences; President Peter Salovey; Jonathan Holloway, dean of Yale College; and Lynn Cooley, dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. (Photo by Michael Marsland)

The first incumbent of a newly created deanship to lead the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) and the newly appointed deans of the Graduate School and Yale College were announced by President Peter Salovey on May 21.

Tamar Gendler has been named the inaugural dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences; Lynn Cooley will be the dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences; and Jonathan Holloway will serve as the dean of Yale College. Their appointments are effective July 1.

“With the creation of a dean for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the deans of the Graduate School and Yale College will be able to focus more attention on the quality of graduate and undergraduate education, respectively, including academic curriculum and student life,” said Salovey in an email about the appointments.

“Faculty recruitment, appointment, tenure, and promotion will be handled primarily by the dean of FAS. The dean of Yale College will have a key role in leading the expansion of Yale College and the formation of two new residential colleges. The dean of the Graduate School will continue to advance graduate student preparation for scholarly and other professions, as well as focus on the campus experience for graduate students,” the President explained.

Profiles of the three new deans follow:

Tamar Gendler

Tamar Gendler

Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Tamar Szabó Gendler is the Vincent J. Scully Professor of Philosophy, professor of psychology and cognitive science, and deputy provost for humanities and initiatives.

She received her B.A. in humanities and mathematics and philosophy from Yale College in 1987 and her Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard in 1996. After a decade teaching first at Syracuse University and then at Cornell University, she returned to Yale as a professor of philosophy and as chair of the Cognitive Science Program. In 2010, she became chair of the Department of Philosophy.

Her work lies at the intersection of philosophy and psychology, and she is the author of “Thought Experiments” (2000) and “Intuition, Imagination and Philosophical Methodology” (2010), and editor or co-editor of “Conceivability and Possibility” (2002), “Perceptual Experience” (2006), “The Elements of Philosophy” (2008), and “The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Methodology” (forthcoming).

Gendler has held fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Fellowship Program in the Humanities, the National Science Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies/Ryskamp Fellowship Program, the Collegium Budapest Institute for Advanced Studies, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation New Directions Program. In 2013, she was awarded Yale College’s Sidonie Miskimin Clauss ’75 Teaching Prize for Excellence in the Humanities.

Lynn Cooley

Lynn Cooley

Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Science

Lynn Cooley is the C.N.H. Long Professor of Genetics, professor of cell biology and of molecular, cellular, and developmental biology. She has served as the director of the Combined Program in the Biological & Biomedical Sciences since 2001.

She received her B.A. from Connecticut College in 1976, and her earned her Ph.D. from the University of Texas in 1984 for research carried out with Sterling Professor Dieter Söll in Yale’s Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry. She was a postdoctoral fellow at the Carnegie Institution of Science where she established new methods using transposable elements for genetic and molecular analysis of genes in the fruit fly Drosophila model system.

Her research focuses on the development of female gametes, or eggs, inDrosophila, especially on two key aspects of egg development during oogenesis: the role of intercellular bridges called ring canals in developing egg chambers, and the regulation of oocyte growth. Cellular mechanisms used to control oocyte development in Drosophila are directly relevant to female fertility in other animals, including humans.

Cooley is currently serving on the board of directors of the Genetics Society of America and as a council delegate for the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She has been recognized with a Pew Scholar Award from the Pew Charitable Trusts, is a member of the Connecticut Academy for Science and Engineering, and is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She has published numerous scientific articles in the journals of several different scientific fields.

John Holloway

Jonathan Holloway

Dean of Yale College

Jonathan Holloway is professor of history and American studies, and professor and chair of the Department of African American Studies.

He received his B.A. from Stanford University in 1989 and his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1995. He has served as master of Calhoun College and chair of the Council of Masters.

A specialist in post-emancipation United States history with a focus on cultural and intellectual history, Holloway is the author of “Confronting the Veil: Abram Harris Jr., E. Franklin Frazier, and Ralph Bunche, 1919-1941” (2002) and “Jim Crow Wisdom: Memory and Identity in Black America Since 1940” (2013). He edited Ralph Bunche’s “A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership” (2005) and co-edited the anthology “Black Scholars on the Line: Race, Social Science, and American Thought in the 20th Century” (2007). He is editor of a new version of W.E.B. Du Bois’ “The Souls of Black Folk,” to be published by Yale University Press in 2015.

Holloway received the William Clyde DeVane Award for Distinguished Scholarship and Teaching in Yale College in 2009. He has held fellowships with the Stanford Humanities Center, the Ford Foundation, the Whitney Humanities Center at Yale, and the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at Harvard University. In 2011–2012 he was an Alphonse Fletcher senior fellow (acknowledging work studying the legacies of Brown v. Board of Education). He participates in the Organization of American Historians’ Distinguished Lectureship Program and regularly leads summer seminars on Jim Crow and American citizenship for the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Thanks and salutes

In his announcement, Salovey also thanked the the advisory committee of 13 faculty members and two students, and its chair, Professor Marvin Chun, for its recommendations about the three leadership positions.

“I take this opportunity to salute the dedication and leadership of Mary Miller, Sterling Professor of History of Art, who has served as dean of Yale College for the past six years, and of Tom Pollard, Sterling Professor of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, who has served as dean of the Graduate School for the past four years. We are indebted to Dean Miller and Dean Pollard for their leadership and commitment to Yale,” Salovey wrote.

“This is an exciting time for Yale,” he added, “and I am confident that the new deans will provide vision and leadership for our university in the years ahead.”