A woman with an extensive resume, including work with the U.S. Department of Defense, will take over as senior vice president and provost for John Moseley, who is retiring June 30.
Dr. Linda P. Brady, currently the dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at North Carolina State University, will take office July 1.
“I am honored to have been selected for this important position,” Brady said in a University news release.
Brady worked with the U.S. State Department and Department of Defense from 1978 to 1985 and held several positions.
University President Dave Frohnmayer wrote in an e-mail that he is not concerned with how military experience could be perceived by the public in light of recent controversy regarding the University’s connection to the Department of Defense.
“Dean Brady had a distinguished career in the field of arms control and disarmament. I have not heard of anyone who is ‘mad’ that Dr. Brady has such an important part of her career in public service at the highest levels. If there is such a person, he or she is short-sighted and engaged in classical stereotypical thinking that fair-minded people should strive to avoid,” Frohnmayer wrote.
“I will work tirelessly to promote academic excellence and the academic vision for the University,” Brady said.
Brady’s colleagues at NC State spoke highly of her work.
“From my vantage point, everything that Brady did for the University was positive,” said Andy Taylor, the associate professor of the Political Science Department at NC State.
Taylor credited Brady as being largely responsible for raising the College of Humanities and Social Sciences from “somewhat of an appendage of NC State University to a more prominent figure on campus,” Taylor said. “It’s not very easy to raise a profile for a college like ours.”
Brady, a New York City native, was also praised by Matt Zingraff, associate dean for Research and Engagement in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at NC State.
“I found her thinking and her plans to be deliberative and thoughtful,” Zingraff said. “Her strengths are that she’s a very honest and sincere person- there really aren’t any weaknesses,” he added.
Bradley Wilson, the newspaper advisor for NC State’s student-run newspaper, The Technician, said Brady took the time to answer her own phone calls and had positive relationships with members of the University community.
“I enjoyed my personal dealings with her a lot, when you needed to talk to her, she was amazingly accessible,” he said.
Currently, Brady has begun to familiarize herself with the campus and the different academic departments, and is looking through program operations and contacting the different academic units, Frohnmayer said.
“She’s off to a very fast start,” he said.
As provost, Brady will work closely with Frohnmayer. Her job responsibilities include speaking for University academic programs to the larger University system, and oversight of budgets, academic priorities, student affairs and diversity issues. Brady will also be working on research regarding the role of negations in war termination.
According to the University’s news release, Brady was the first person in her family to go to college, and she earned her master’s degree in political science from Rutgers in 1970, and her doctorate in political science from Ohio State University in 1974.
Her other work experience includes leading the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology from 1993 to 2001. She was a professor of national security at the US Military Academy, and special assistant for mutual and balanced force reductions in the defense department during the Carter administration.
Zingraff said the University made a good decision in hiring Brady.
“I don’t think there is any doubt that the University of Oregon won. She’s a good person, she’s honest, she’s deliberate, she’s smart. The university here will certainly miss her,” he said.
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