Debra Friedman, a senior administrator at the University of Washington, has been named dean of the College of Public Programs. Friedman will lead the college’s effort to enhance its academic excellence and achieve far-reaching social relevance. At the University of Washington, Friedman managed university-wide planning and visioning initiatives. As associate dean for undergraduate education, she increased by ten-fold the participation of undergraduates in faculty research and as director of special projects, development and alumni relations, Friedman directed the public launch of a $2 billion fund-raising campaign.

While many cancer research programs focus heavily on specific types of the disease, Stephen Albert Johnston hopes to find a universal cure that will be effective against virtually any type of cancer. Johnston, a pre-eminent scientist whose work spans a broad range of genetic and medical research, has been recruited to head a new Center for Innovations in Medicine within the Biodesign Institute at ASU. Johnston joins ASU from University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center where he was professor of internal medicine and microbiology and held the Eugene Tragus Chair in Cardiology. The new Center for Innovations in Medicine will expand on the advances Johnston made at the Center for Biomedical Inventions at his former college home, incorporating ASU’s strengths in engineering and bioinformatics.

Chris Callahan, associate dean of the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland, has been named as founding dean of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. He worked as a reporter, editor and Washington correspondent for the Associated Press before joining the University of Maryland as a faculty member in 1990.
The Cronkite School was previously a unit of the College of Public Programs at ASU; on July 1, it became a separate entity and is scheduled to move from the Tempe campus to the new Downtown Phoenix campus. Cronkite himself reviewed the résumés of the finalists for the founding dean’s position.

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