University’s chief executive joins more than 200 inductees who are “united by a place in history and by an opportunity to shape the future through the academy’s work to advance the public good.”
University of Rochester President Sarah Mangelsdorf has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the nation’s most highly regarded honors for artistic, academic, and scientific leaders who engage in advancing the public good.
Mangelsdorf, who also holds the title of G. Robert Witmer Jr. University Professor, is one of 276 artists, scholars, scientists, and executives in the public, nonprofit, and private sectors inducted into the 2020 class. Joining her as a member this year are songwriter and activist Joan Baez, Brandeis University law professor Anita Hill, former US attorney general Eric Holder Jr., author Ann Patchett, poets Joy Harjo and Claudia Rankine, NIH immunologist Yasmine Belkaid, University of Washington president Ana Mari Cauce, and Duke University president Vincent Price.
Also elected this year was Grammy Award–winning composer and Eastman School of Music graduate Maria Schneider ’85E (MM).
Since July 1, 2019, Mangelsdorf has served as the 11th president of the University, where she is also a professor of psychology. As a noted leader in higher education, she has earned recognition for her work on issues of academic quality, educational access, and diversity and inclusion at some of the nation’s leading public and private institutions. In her first year at Rochester, she has highlighted the strength of the institution’s multimillion-dollar research endeavor, the University’s ties to the Rochester community and region, and the importance of equity and inclusion as key attributes of Rochester’s values as a university.
In announcing the members of the class this month, David Oxtoby, the president of the academy, said the inductees are “united by a place in history and by an opportunity to shape the future through the academy’s work to advance the public good.”
Internationally known for her research on emotional and personality development, Mangelsdorf began her career on the faculty of the University of Michigan. She served as chair of the psychology department and dean of the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She was later named dean of the largest college at Northwestern University, and served as provost and chief academic officer at the University of Wisconsin–Madison before being named Rochester’s president.
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