More news of Yale people

Yale University

View full image

Elected

Alumni elected Felicia Norwood ’89JD (left) of Indianapolis to a six-year term on Yale’s Board of Trustees as an alumni fellow. Norwood, who is executive vice president and president of government health benefits at Elevance Health (formerly Anthem), has worked in both government and the insurance industry in her legal career. She succeeds Michael Warren ’90 on the board.

Appointed

Two new heads of college will move into Yale residential colleges this summer. Michal Beth Dinkler, an associate professor of New Testament at the Divinity School, will succeed Mary Lui as head of Timothy Dwight College. Her husband, John Dinkler, will serve as associate head. Samuel Moyn, the Chancellor James Kent Professor of Law and History, is the new head of Grace Hopper College, succeeding Julia Adams. Moyn’s partner Alisa Berger will serve as associate head.

Jeffrey Brock ’92 has been appointed to a second five-year term as dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, beginning July 1. Brock has overseen major changes at the school: its transition from part of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences to an autonomous school in 2022; a commitment from the university to increase its faculty by nearly a third, with 30 new positions; and a plan for new and renovated buildings on lower Hillhouse Avenue. A mathematician by discipline, Brock earned his PhD at UC Berkeley.

After shepherding the Peabody Museum through a four-year renovation and expansion project, David Skelly will serve a third five-year term as director of the museum beginning July 1. Skelly is the Frank R. Oastler Professor of Ecology. During his tenure, the museum raised $250 million for the renovation project and for making admission free for everyone.

Retired

David Shoehalter, who has coached in Yale’s track and field program since 1994, retired at the end of this spring season. Shoehalter was an assistant coach under Mark Young ’68 until Young’s retirement in 2010, when Shoehalter was named the Mark T. Young ’68 Director of Cross Country and Track and Field. During Shoehalter’s tenure as director, five of his athletes won the Nellie Pratt Elliot Award or the William Neely Mallory Award, the top prizes given to graduating student athletes in Yale College.

Remembered

Joel Schiavone ’58, a New Haven real estate developer who kicked off the revitalization of the city’s downtown in the 1980s, died on April 22. He was 87. Schiavone acquired commercial buildings on Chapel, College, and Crown Streets next to the Yale campus and set about improving them to make the area more attractive to pedestrians. His efforts paved the way for a return of retail, bars, restaurants, and housing to the downtown area. Schiavone was well known in the city for his banjo playing and his occasional forays into politics.

Peter Demetz ’56PhD, Sterling Professor Emeritus of Germanic Languages and Literatures, died on April 30. He was 101 years old. Born in Prague to a Jewish mother and a Catholic father, Demetz survived Nazi persecution and emigrated to the United States in 1952. After earning his PhD at Yale, he joined the faculty, teaching in German and comparative literature until his retirement in 1991. In addition to his scholarship on German literature, Demetz wrote extensively about his home country, the Czech Republic, which honored him in 2000 with its Medal of Merit.

Beatrice Bartlett ’80PhD, a professor of history whose specialty was modern China, died on April 1 in Branford, Connecticut. She was 95. Known as Betsy, Bartlett taught at the Brearley School in New York before enrolling in graduate school at Yale in her late thirties. She was among the first American scholars to work in the Qing archives in Beijing after the US and China reestablished diplomatic relations in 1980. She joined the Yale faculty in 1983 and retired in 2006.