Deborah Prentice, dean of the faculty for the past three years and a Princeton professor of psychology since 1989, will become provost July 1. She will succeed David S. Lee *99, who will return to teaching and research after four years as provost.
Being provost was a “wonderful experience,” Lee said, but during his tenure he missed the connection to academic life — the advising and close connection to students — that he had as a professor of economics and public affairs.
President Eisgruber ’83 said Lee will direct a new project on higher-education metrics and outcomes. Initially the project will be Princeton-based, Lee said, but “with an eye toward understanding our sector of higher education more broadly.”
One focus will be gaining a better understanding of the impact of the University’s investment in its students: “Learning more about our alumni will be key,” Lee said. Another is the University’s research mission, he said, examining the “societal return to basic research and how it translates to, for example, new technologies and affects the economy.”
Eisgruber praised Prentice as a “superb” dean of the faculty who is “knowledgeable, thoughtful, insightful, compassionate, and wise.” Prentice said she will become provost at a critical time. Princeton’s strategic and campus planning efforts have provided “a compelling vision of how we can build on the extraordinary strengths of this University,” she said, “and I am eager to work with the entire University community to make this vision a reality.”