DEI Summit | University of Michigan

Susan M. Collins is the provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University of Michigan, as well as the Edward M. Gramlich Collegiate Professor of Public Policy, professor of economics, and former dean of the Ford School (2007-17). Before coming to Michigan, she was on the economics faculty at Georgetown University and Harvard University, and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution (where she retains a nonresident affiliation). She is an international economist whose research interests center on understanding and fostering economic growth in industrial, emerging market, and developing countries. She is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. She served a term as president of the Association for Professional Schools of International Affairs (APSIA) from 2013-15 and, earlier in her career, as a senior staff economist on the President’s Council of Economic Advisers. Collins received her bachelor’s degree, summa cum laude, in economics from Harvard University and her doctorate in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Dr. Courtney D. Cogburn is an associate professor at the Columbia University School of Social Work and faculty of the Columbia Population Research Center. She employs a transdisciplinary research strategy to improve the characterization and measurement of racism and in examining the role of racism in the production of racial inequities in health. Dr. Cogburn’s work also explores the potential of media and technology in eradicating racism and eliminating racial inequities in health. She is the lead creator of 1000 Cut Journey, an immersive virtual reality experience of racism that premiered at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival. She directs the Cogburn Research Group and co-directs the Justice + Equity + Tech (JET) Laboratory at Columbia University. Dr. Cogburn completed postdoctoral training at Harvard University in the Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholar Program and at the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. She received her Ph.D. in Education and Psychology, and MSW from the University of Michigan and her BA in Psychology from the University of Virginia.

Named a 2005 MacArthur Fellow and President Obama’s first appointment to the National Council on the Arts, Aaron Dworkin served as dean of the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theatre & Dance. He is currently a tenured full professor of arts leadership and entrepreneurship at SMTD as well as serving as a Professor of Entrepreneurial Studies at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business. Aaron is a successful social entrepreneur having founded The Sphinx Organization, the leading arts organization focused on diversity. He also serves as host of the nationally-broadcast Arts Engines show in collaboration with Detroit Public Television.

Founder of U-M’s Arts in Color student organization and creator of an interview series called The Power of the Performing Arts focused on raising awareness about how the pandemic is affecting performing arts communities.

Member of the Ojibwe Sault Ste. Marie Tribe and the Anishinaabe Theater Exchange, a U-M collaboration that uses theater to activate networks with Native communities in the Great Lakes region and develops performances examining the social concerns and histories of the Anishinaabe people.

Acclaimed television and film actor Wendell Pierce grew up in New Orleans before attending The Juilliard School for drama. He has appeared in over 30 films and 50 television shows, as well as dozens of stage productions. As a television actor, he became known for his roles as Bunk Moreland in The Wire and trombonist Antoine Batiste in Treme, as well as portraying James Greer in Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan. He had roles in the films Malcolm X, Selma, and Ray. In 2019, he performed the lead role of Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman on London’s West End, a role for which he received a nomination for the Olivier Award for Best Actor. During the 2020-21 academic year, Wendell is participating in the Digital Artist Residency program.

Dr. Mark S. Schlissel is the 14th president of the University of Michigan and the first physician-scientist to lead the institution.

A graduate of Princeton University (A.B., summa cum laude, 1979, Biochemical Sciences), he earned both M.D. and Ph.D. degrees at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (1986, Physiological Chemistry). He completed residency training in internal medicine at Hopkins Hospital and conducted postdoctoral research as a Bristol-Myers Cancer Research Fellow under David Baltimore at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Whitehead Institute. President Schlissel is a board-certified internist.

President Schlissel previously was provost of Brown University, where he was responsible for all academic programmatic and budgetary functions within Brown’s schools and colleges, as well as its libraries, research institutes and centers.

Dr. Robert Sellers is the Vice Provost for Equity, Inclusion, and Academic Affairs, and also serves as the Charles D. Moody Collegiate Professor of Psychology and Education. As Vice Provost, Dr. Sellers works with the provost and executive vice president for academic affairs on matters related to diversity at the University as well as a broad range of academic issues including the budget, faculty tenure and promotions, and student enrollment. He oversees operations of four central administrative units.