Dean Jane Close Conoley, recently named next President of California State University, Long Beach
The California State University Board of Trustees named Jane Close Conoley, Dean of the Gevirtz School at UC Santa Barbara, the next president of California State University, Long Beach (CSULB). Conoley becomes the first woman to be appointed as president of CSULB, and is expected to begin her new position August 1. She will succeed F. King Alexander who left in June to become president and chancellor of Louisiana State University. A search committee is being formed to find her replacement at UC Santa Barbara.
“Our UC Santa Barbara community will feel her loss keenly,” UC Santa Barbara Chancellor Henry Yang said in a statement. “At the same time, we are proud and thrilled that Dean Conoley has been appointed to this important leadership position, where she will be able to contribute in new and exciting ways to California’s higher education system and our global academic community.”
Since 2006, Conoley has served as the dean and a professor of counseling, clinical and school psychology of UCSB’s Gevirtz Graduate School of Education, while temporarily leaving that position to serve as interim chancellor at UC Riverside from January-August 2013.
Prior to her service at UCSB, Conoley served as dean and professor of educational psychology at Texas A&M University (1996-2005), associate dean for research at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s Teachers College (1989-94). She also held faculty positions at Texas Woman’s University and Syracuse University.
The author or editor of 21 books, Conoley earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the College of New Rochelle and a doctorate in school psychology from the University of Texas at Austin.