By Judith Schwartzstein, Director of Public Affairs, Sarah Lawrence College

Apr. 22, 2015:  Sarah Lawrence College has announced the appointment of Kanwal Singh as dean of the college, effective August 1, 2015. 

"I am delighted to announce the appointment of Dr. Singh," said President Karen R. Lawrence. "She is a respected scholar and teacher, a much valued colleague, and an accomplished administrator."

Singh will succeed Dean Jerrilynn D. Dodds, with whom she has worked closely on a wide range of curricular, programmatic, and faculty issues. Said Dodds, who will remain on the faculty of Sarah Lawrence after six years as dean: "Kanwal Singh is a gifted administrator who can balance a deep understanding of our distinguished faculty with a keen mastery of the administrative demands of the position of dean of the college. We are so fortunate she will take the helm."

Singh earned her MA and PhD in theoretical physics at the University of California at Berkeley and her BS in physics with departmental honors, summa cum laude, at the University of Maryland at College Park. She held a National Defense Science and Engineering Doctoral Fellowship and a post-doctoral fellowship from the American-Scandinavian Foundation. Her research focused on constructing models in order to understand low-temperature, low-dimensional systems, such as thin films of superfluids or superconducting material. 

She has published on low-temperature disordered systems as well as on the teaching of science and mathematics and has taught at Middlebury College, Wellesley College, and Eugene Lang College.

She also received a competitive fellowship from the American Association for the Advancement of Science for scientists interested in policy at the national level, working at the National Science Foundation's Directorate of Education and Human Resources. Singh's work at the foundation focused on large-scale, multi-year efforts of local school districts in partnership with institutions of higher education to improve science and mathematics teaching. This experience expanded and strengthened her interests in science education.

She also worked with Bank Street College of Education for several years as a consultant on a Carnegie Corporation-funded project to help improve its teacher education program.

Pictured here:  Dr. Kanwal Singh, to be the new dean of Sarah Lawrence College.

Photo courtesy Judith Schwartzstein, Director of Public Affairs, Sarah Lawrence College