Grad school dean to serve second term

Jo Rae Wright was reappointed as dean of the Graduate School and vice provost for graduate education Monday.

Provost Peter Lange appointed Wright to her second five-year term on the completion of her fourth-year review, citing her “innovative leadership.”

“Dean Wright has been a superb leader,” Lange said in a University statement released Monday. “She has reformed Graduate School finances, sought to assure a stronger financial base into the future, brought new essential services to graduate students and earned the respect of faculty throughout the university as she has pressed to improve and innovate in graduate education even in these tighter economic times.”

Wright, a professor in the department of cell biology, has been a faculty member since 1993 and a dean and vice provost since 2006.

Wright is actively involved in research, and her lab is funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health. Her research focuses on the process in which lung immune cells facilitate normal breathing.