We are pleased to share the outcome of the search for the Susan Welch Dean of the Pennsylvania State University College of the Liberal Arts. Dr. Clarence Lang, interim dean of the College of the Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Kansas, has been appointed to serve as Penn State's next dean, effective July 1, 2019.
Dr. Lang has been part of the Kansas faculty since 2011. In addition to being interim dean, he is the Dean's Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences in the Department of African and African-American Studies (AAAS) and a professor of American studies. He has served as chair of AAAS; acting/interim director of the Hall Center for the Humanities; a senior administrative fellow in the Office of the Provost; and co-chair of the university's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Advisory Group.
An active member of the University of Kansas community, he has been acting director of graduate studies in American studies, president of the Black Faculty and Staff Council, a McNair Scholars mentor, and a member of the Langston Hughes Visiting Professor Committee and Bill Tuttle Distinguished Lecture in American Studies Committee. Lang's research focuses on black social movements in the 20th century United States; African-American labor and working-class history; and black communities in the urban Midwest.
Before joining the University of Kansas, he was a faculty member in the departments of African-American Studies and History at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. At Illinois, Lang was a Helen Corley Petit Scholar in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and a faculty fellow with the Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities. Dr. Lang received his bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri, his master's in history from Southern Illinois University, and his doctorate in history from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Information sent by Michael Baer, Partner; Natalie Leonhard, Managing Associate and Sherlene Parsons, Associate