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| Dear members of the Wayne State University community, I am pleased to announce that Keith Whitfield, vice provost for academic affairs at Duke University and an expert on aging among African Americans, has been named provost of Wayne State University, effective June 1, 2016. Following a national search, the WSU Board of Governors approved Dr. Whitfield’s appointment at its April 1 meeting. Dr. Whitfield is succeeding Margaret E. Winters, who is retiring after serving as provost and senior vice president for academic affairs since April 2013. Margaret spent 14 years at Wayne State in several leadership positions, and we are grateful for her service. Dr. Whitfield’s academic credentials, his commitment to excellence and his understanding of diverse communities make him exceptionally prepared for this opportunity, and we look forward to his guidance and leadership at Wayne State University. As chief academic officer, he will be responsible for all matters related to the instructional mission of the university, student performance and retention, and academic personnel policies and decisions, among other duties. Dr. Whitfield also holds Duke appointments as professor in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, research professor in the Department of Geriatric Medicine at Duke University Medical Center, and senior fellow in the Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development. He is co-director of the Center on Biobehavioral Health Disparities Research. More than 180 articles, books and book chapters have been published by Dr. Whitfield on cognition, health, and individual development and aging with a focus on African Americans. He currently serves as managing editor for the journal Ethnicity and Health, is a longtime member of the advisory board of Wayne State’s Institute on Aging, has participated in a number of committees for the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Medicine, and has served on several study sections for the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Whitfield earned a bachelor’s in psychology from the College of Santa Fe, a Ph.D. in lifespan developmental psychology from Texas Tech University, and received postdoctoral training in quantitative genetics from the University of Colorado Boulder. Please join me in welcoming Dr. Whitfield to Wayne State.
M. Roy Wilson
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