Vanderbilt has seen a number of high-profile appointments during the past few months, including two deans, both promoted from within their schools; two vice chancellors; and several senior posts in the Division of Development and Alumni Relations.
New Deans for Arts and Science, Medicine
In the College of Arts and Science, Carolyn Dever was appointed dean last December. Dever was offered the position after a national search to replace Richard McCarty, who was named provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at Vanderbilt in May. Dever had served as interim dean since June.
An expert on Victorian literature and gender studies, Dever joined the Vanderbilt faculty in 1999 as professor of English. She served two years as the first associate dean for graduate education in the College of Arts and Science, then returned after a yearlong research sabbatical as executive dean with responsibilities for faculty and research.
Her books include Skeptical Feminism: Activist Theory, Activist Practice (2003) and Death and the Mother from Dickens to Freud: Victorian Fiction and the Anxiety of Origins (1998), and she edited with Margaret Cohen The Literary Channel: The Inter-National Invention of the Novel (2001).
In October, Dr. Jeff Balser became the 11th dean of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine since its founding in 1875. Balser, who had served as interim dean of the school since last July, will continue to serve as associate vice chancellor for research.
“I recall sitting in Light Hall as a student in 1984, listening to Dean [John] Chapman give a talk about the contemporary challenges in academic medicine,” says Balser, who received his M.D. and Ph.D. in pharmacology from Vanderbilt in 1990. “I remember thinking at that time how exciting it must be to be dean of the School of Medicine at Vanderbilt. I still feel exactly the same way, and I am extraordinarily grateful for this opportunity.”
Balser trained as a resident and fellow in anesthesiology and critical care medicine at Johns Hopkins University, where he joined the faculty in 1995. He returned to Vanderbilt in 1998 as associate dean for physician scientists. In 2001 he was appointed the James Tayloe Gwathmey Professor and Chair of Anesthesiology. Three years later he became associate vice chancellor for research, heading a period of significant expansion that moved Vanderbilt into 10th place among U.S. medical schools in funding from the National Institutes of Health.
New Leadership for Public Affairs, Development and Alumni Relations
Beth Fortune was named Vanderbilt’s vice chancellor for public affairs in December after serving in the position on an interim basis for the previous six months.
The former political reporter and press secretary to former Tennessee Gov. Don Sundquist joined Vanderbilt in September 2000 as associate vice chancellor for public affairs.
As vice chancellor for public affairs, Fortune leads the university’s comprehensive communications, government and community initiatives and serves as the university’s chief spokesperson.
In January, Susie S. Stalcup, formerly the chief fundraising officer for Columbia University Medical Center, became Vanderbilt’s new vice chancellor for development and alumni relations.
In her new role she will work to complete the current $1.75 billion Shape the Future campaign, which is scheduled to conclude in 2010. She oversees development and alumni activities throughout Vanderbilt, including the medical center and all schools and programs within the university.
As vice president for development since 2004 at Columbia University Medical Center in New York City, Stalcup had led all aspects of CUMC’s $1 billion capital campaign, which met its goal two and a half years before its scheduled December 2011 conclusion.
Christopher P. Toft has been named associate vice chancellor for university development. Toft oversees development programs for the College of Arts and Science, Blair School of Music, Divinity School, School of Engineering, Peabody College, Law School, and the Owen Graduate School of Management, as well as regional major gifts, the Parents and Grandparents Campaign and the Vanderbilt Fund.
Toft most recently headed all fundraising initiatives at the University of Illinois-Chicago College of Medicine and the University of Illinois Medical Center, where he served as chief development officer for medicine and associate dean, and was a member of the senior management team for the University of Illinois Foundation.
James E. Stofan has been named associate vice chancellor for alumni relations. Stofan, who most recently directed alumni relations for the University of California system, oversees Vanderbilt’s alumni relations program and outreach to the university’s 121,000 alumni as well as the Reunion program.
As assistant vice president for alumni affairs in the University of California Office of the President, Stofan coordinated more than 10 campus alumni programs representing more than 1.5 million alumni worldwide. Under his leadership UC reduced its “lost alumni” percentage from 24 percent to 8.9 percent and developed system-wide international chapters in London, Paris, Beijing, Mexico City, New Delhi, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Stockholm. He also directed the first-ever UC system-wide strategic planning effort for alumni relations.