Newsmakers

Wendy Cadge, the Barbara Mandel Professor of the Humanistic Social Sciences, who also serves as senior associate dean for strategic initiatives and head of the Division of Social Sciences, will become the dean of the university’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences on June 1. In this role, Cadge replaces Eric Chasalow, the Irving Fine Professor of Music, who was the GSAS dean for seven years. An award-winning teacher, Cadge lectures on and writes about religion in the contemporary United States, especially as it relates to health care, immigration and sexuality, and is founder and director of the Chaplaincy Innovation Lab.

Brandeis has hosted an array of thought leaders and public figures this semester. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser on COVID-19, joined surgeon/New Yorker staff writer Atul Gawande and New York Times opinion writer Elisabeth Rosenthal for a conversation on science journalism and the pandemic, moderated by journalism program director Neil Swidey. Historian Alice Kelikian held a livestreamed conversation with actor Gillian Anderson (“The Crown,” “The X-Files”). And past Richman Fellows Angela Glover Blackwell and Jeffrey Brown, along with Gittler Prize winner Beverly Daniel Tatum, discussed the topic “Black Lives Matter Under a New Presidency” with Carina Ray, the Harry Coplan Chair of Social Sciences.

A new Brandeis Sustainability Committee has been formed to help the university improve its sustainability performance in education and operations. It will review and analyze best practices and opportunities; assess baselines; recommend improvements; and, when possible, make implementations in such areas as dining, procurement, grounds management, energy efficiency and climate resilience. Mary Fischer, sustainability programs manager; Jesse Zucker ’21, Student Senate Sustainability Committee chair; and Colleen Hitchcock, associate professor of ecology, are the co-chairs. Committee members will include faculty, staff and students.

Aretina Hamilton has joined Brandeis as the director of diversity, equity and inclusion programs, training, education and development. Her charge includes leading educational initiatives and providing consultation services to leaders, faculty and staff across campus. She will also oversee Deis Impact and the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Student Advisory Council. Previously, Hamilton was associate director of diversity, equity and inclusion at Michigan’s Interlochen Center for the Arts, where she also taught several courses. Hamilton, who has a PhD in geography from the University of Kentucky, is completing her first book, “Black Queer Cartographies,” which is under contract with the University of North Carolina Press.

Ruth Charney ’72, MA’72, the Theodore and Evelyn Berenson Professor of Mathematics at Brandeis, is the new president of the American Mathematical Society. One of her priorities as AMS president will be to increase diversity and inclusion within the study of mathematics. Charney served as president of the Association for Women in Mathematics from 2013-15.