Trustees Presidential Search Committee

Andrew J. Nussbaum ’85, chair, is a partner in the law firm of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where he specializes in mergers and acquisitions, cross-border transactions and corporate governance. He has been a member of the Amherst College Board of Trustees since 2010, serving as chair since 2018.

Lisa Brooks, a historian and literary scholar, is the Henry S. Poler '59 Presidential Teaching Professor of English and American Studies. She has served on the Committee of Six and is the co-director of the Mellon Foundation Senior President Grant, “Mapping Native Intellectual Networks of the Northeast.” Professor Brooks received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2020. She has taught at Amherst since 2012.

Katherine K. Chia ’88, P’22 is a co-founding principal of Desai Chia Architecture, a firm with an established reputation for authentic design, sustainable strategies and the craft of building. She is currently the president of the Society of Alumni. Chia served on the Amherst College Board of Trustees from 2000-2006 and won the College's Medal for Eminent Service in 2017.

Dale R. Hendricks, director of admission & financial aid systems & strategies, has worked at Amherst College for 12 years. He is trained as a facilitator through the Five-College Intergroup Dialogue (IGD) program, served on the Strategic Planning Committee and the staff survey working group, and is currently a member of the College Board’s New England Regional Assembly Council.

The Rev. Phillip A. Jackson ’85 was named the priest-in-charge of Trinity Church Wall Street in Manhattan in 2020, after serving as vicar since 2015. He was appointed to the Board of Trustees in 2017 and currently serves on the Mead Museum Advisory Board and the College's Bicentennial Advisory Committee.

Kannan “Jagu” Jagannathan, a theoretical physicist, is the Bruce B. Benson '43 and Lucy Wilson Benson Professor of Physics. He has chaired the New England section of the American Physical Society and served as the assistant editor of the American Journal of Physics. A member of the Physics and Astronomy department since 1981, he has served on the Committee of Six a number of times and an earlier Presidential Search Committee.

Andrenae Jones ’23 is a Film and Media Studies and English double major. She is a member of the Transfer Student Association, an editorial assistant intern at The Common, and an academic intern/research assistant for the Film and Media Studies department. She is from Boston, Massachusetts.

Chantal E. Kordula ’94 is a partner at the law firm of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, where her practice focuses on international business and financing transactions, particularly involving Latin America. She has served on the Board of Trustees since 2019.

David A. Novak ’91, P’24 is co-president of the private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice. He was appointed to the Amherst College Board of Trustees in 2018, and currently serves as chair of the Budget and Finance Committee.

Dwight M. Poler ’87, P’19, is founder and CEO of AccelR8 Ventures, a climate change mitigation fund he set up upon retiring from 24 years at Bain Capital, where he founded and managed the European private equity business for 18 years. He was appointed to the Amherst Board of Trustees in 2015, and currently serves as co-chair of the Buildings and Grounds Committee.

The Hon. Sarah Bloom Raskin '83, P'14, P'17, the former Deputy Secretary of the Treasury and former Governor of the Federal Reserve Board, is Professor of the Practice of Law at Duke Law School and a distinguished fellow at the Duke Law School's Global Financial Markets Center. She was appointed to the Board of Trustees in 2017, and is currently the chair of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee.

Kathryn (Kate) Redmond ’23, from Pocasset, Massachusetts, is a pre-medicine Psychology major. She is a member of the Questbridge Low-Income Community, conducts developmental psychology research in the Child Learning and Development Laboratory, serves as a community advisor for residential life, and plays on the women's ultimate frisbee team.

Paul M. Smith ’76, P’09 is Professor from Practice at Georgetown Law School and Vice President for Litigation and Strategy at the Campaign Legal Center, which seeks to protect voting rights, to defend reasonable campaign finance regulation, and to enforce government ethics rules. He has served on the Amherst College Board of Trustees since 2016, currently chairing the Student Life Committee and representing the College on the Folger Library Board of Governors.

Bradley T. Stafford, lead mechanical shop technician, has worked at Amherst College for more than 23 years. He has served on numerous committees at the College, including multiple terms on the Employee Council. In 2019 he was the inaugural winner of Amherst’s Above and Beyond Award.

Shirley M. Tilghman was president of Princeton University from 2001 to 2013, during which time she oversaw the hiring of more women to the faculty, extensive growth in the role of creative and performing arts on campus, and multiple major initiatives in the sciences and engineering. She has served on the Amherst College Board of Trustees since 2013, currently chairing the Instruction Committee.

Martha M. Umphrey is the Bertrand H. Snell 1894 Professor in Government and chair of the Department of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought. She currently serves on the Committee of Six, and was a faculty representative on Amherst’s 2011 Presidential Search Committee. She is also president of the Association for the Study of Law, Culture, and the Humanities.

Bett K. Schumacher, chief of staff and secretary of the Board of Trustees, will serve as principal staff to the committee.