Two prominent scholars of African-American studies have been appointed deans at Columbia and Yale University, raising the profile of Blacks in senior-level positions at two of the nation’s most selective academic institutions.
Dr. Jonathan Holloway, a professor of history and American Studies and chair of the Department of African American Studies at Yale, was named dean of Yale College by the university’s president, Dr. Peter Salovey.
Dr. Alondra Nelson, a professor of sociology and director of the Institute for Research on Women, Gender, and Sexuality at Columbia, was named dean of social sciences—a newly created position within the College of Arts and Sciences—at the New York Ivy League institution.
Holloway and Nelson’s promotions bring the total number of Black school deans in the Ivy League to five. Dr. Valerie Smith is the dean of the College at Princeton, as is Dr. Charlotte Johnson at Dartmouth. Dr. Cecilia Rouse is the dean of the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton. Dr. Lance Collins is dean of Engineering at Cornell University. Earlier this year, Dr. John L. Jackson Jr., who is the Richard Perry University Professor and Senior Advisor for Diversity in the Office of the Provost at the University of Pennsylvania, was named dean of Penn’s School of Social Policy & Practice.
For Holloway, who earned his Ph.D. from Yale in 1995, these appointments are historic.
“I think it’s a pretty great moment,” he said in an interview with Diverse. “But I hope it’s not just a moment or seen as a weird fad.”
