Lisa M. Lynch, P’17

Lisa M. Lynch, P’17, who served as interim president at Brandeis from July 2015 through June 2016, is the university’s provost and chief academic officer, and the Maurice B. Hexter Professor of Social and Economic Policy.

Previously, she was dean of Brandeis’ Heller School for Social Policy and Management, a post she held from 2008 until her 2014 appointment as provost.

Along with her long, distinguished career in higher education, Lynch is an internationally recognized labor economist, and the author of more than 50 articles and research papers, many on the impact of technological change and organizational innovation, especially training, on productivity and wages.

Lynch has served as chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor (1995-97), director (2004-09) and chair (2007-09) of the board of directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, chair of the Conference of Chairmen of the Federal Reserve System (2009), and president of the Labor and Employment Relations Association (2013-14).

In addition, she has served on the Governor’s Council of Economic Advisors for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (2008-15) and the National Academies Committee on National Statistics (2009-15). She is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and a research fellow at IZA (the Institute for Labor Economics, Germany).

She has also served as a faculty member at Tufts, MIT, the Ohio State University, and the University of Bristol.

During Lynch’s term as interim president, her focus was on advancing the university’s core principles, including making a renewed commitment to greater diversity and inclusion on campus.

As provost, Lynch oversees the full scope of the university’s educational and research activities. In this role, she is aligning the university’s resources with its mission, and fostering a strong community devoted to shared learning, reflection and civil engagement.