Inside Iowa State: Iowa State University

INSIDE IOWA STATE
October 26, 2001

Visits set for Ag dean candidates

by Diana Pounds
Three candidates for the College of Agriculture dean post will visit campus during the next couple of weeks. The candidates are: Thomas Fretz, dean of the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources at the University of Maryland, College Park; Lee Sommers, director of the Agricultural Experiment Station at Colorado State University, Fort Collins; and Catherine O'Connor Woteki, senior research scientist with the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources at the University of Maryland, College Park, and professor of nutrition and food safety at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln.

Each candidate will spend two days on campus during the weeks of Oct. 29 and Nov. 5. Each will participate in an open forum on "Agricultural and College Issues, Including Diversity." Forum dates are:

Fretz, Monday, Oct. 29
Sommers, Monday, Nov. 5
Woteki, Wednesday, Nov. 7

All forums will be from 3 to 4:30 p.m. in 1204 Kildee, and will be followed by a public reception.

Candidates' complete vitas are available on the provost Web site at http://www.provost.iastate.edu/agdean/.

Thomas Fretz
Fretz has been agriculture and natural resources dean and director of the Maryland Agricultural Experiment Station and Maryland Cooperative Extension Service since 1994. Prior to that, he was at Iowa State, where he served for five years as associate dean and director of the Iowa Agriculture and Home Economics Experiment Station.

At Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Blacksburg, Va., he served as interim director of international development, head of the horticulture department and professor. He also headed the horticulture department at Kansas State University, Manhattan.

He received a B.S. (1964) in horticulture from the University of Maryland, M.S. (1966) in horticulture from the University of Delaware, and Ph.D. (1970) in plant science from the University of Delaware.

Lee Sommers
Sommers has been director of the Agricultural Experiment Station at Colorado State since 1996. He also served as interim dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences at Colorado State for more than a year.

He was a soil scientist with the USDA's Cooperative States Research, Education, and Extension Service, Washington, D.C., in 1994-95. He also headed the department of soil and crop sciences at Colorado State and was an agronomy professor at Purdue University, West Lafayette, Ind.

He received a B.S. (1966) in agriculture from the University of Wisconsin, Platteville, and M.S. (1969) and Ph.D. (1971) degrees, both in soil science from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Catherine O'Connor Woteki
Woteki recently was appointed senior research scientist with the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources at the University of Maryland and also is professor of nutrition and food safety at the University of Nebraska. A nutritional epidemiologist, she served from 1997 through January 2001 as the first under secretary for food safety in the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

She also has served as deputy undersecretary for research, education and economics at the USDA; deputy associate director for science in the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy; director of the food and nutrition board of the National Academy of Sciences/Institute of Medicine; and in other positions with federal departments and offices.

Wotecki received a B.S. (1969) in biology and chemistry from Mary Washington College, Fredericksburg, Va.; and M.S. and Ph.D. (1974) degrees in human nutrition from Virginia Polytechnic.

The new dean of the College of Agriculture will succeed Richard Ross, who began a two-year appointment in the position in July 2000. David Topel, who was Agriculture dean for more than a decade, stepped down from the position in early 2000.