Saint Xavier University Appoints Dr. E. Suzanne Lee to Dean of the School of Education

Saint Xavier University (SXU) is pleased to announce the recent appointment of School of Education (SOE) interim dean E. Suzanne Lee, Ph.D., who will serve as the dean of SXU’s School of Education as of July 1, 2015. Dr. Lee has been the interim dean for the School of Education since July 2014 and was the interim associate dean from January 2014 until June 2014.

Since arriving on the SXU campus in 2002 as an assistant professor in SOE’s Teaching and Leadership Program, Dr. Lee has taken on more responsibilities within this program and after six years became an associate professor from August 2008 to December 2013. She taught numerous classes in SOE’s Teaching and Leadership Program and applies her research methodology expertise throughout her service at Saint Xavier University. In the Teaching and Leadership program, she teaches qualitative inquiry and shepherds students through the research process.

Lee also teaches research courses for other programs in education, and in virtually all of her school and institutional committee work collects qualitative data and uses the analysis to inform policy and programmatic change.

“I am thrilled to be selected as the dean of SXU’s School of Education,” said Dr. E. Suzanne Lee, Ph.D. “Faculty members in the School of Education are the most dedicated, loving, and knowledgeable educators you could have as colleagues, or professors. I look forward to continuing my work with them and the caring and supportive staff who support our undergraduate and graduate students. We serve our students, so that they can be professionals in our communities and serve others.”

Lee secured a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology with a health minor from Eastern Illinois University in 1984, and was certified in secondary education by the state of Illinois. She earned her Master of Science degree in health education at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and was certified as a health education specialist.

Prior to joining SXU, she held numerous positions at Saint Louis University during a five-year span while also pursuing her doctoral studies; those positions included the following -- adjunct assistant professor, director of university’s commitment to justice self-study, graduate assistant, survey consultant, graduate school ethic and value dimension study consultant, and researcher for personal responsibility education program.

She earned her Ph.D. in higher education from Saint Louis University in 2000. Her dissertation was entitled: The Promotion of Justice: Measuring and Assessing the Psychometric Properties.

Additionally, she was the assistant vice president of academic affairs for the Logan College of Chiropractic from 2000 to 2001 where she developed faculty workshops on Measureable Learning Objectives and Problematic Student Behaviors.

Dr. Lee values service in higher education and wrote about the application of her research skills in an article entitled, Scholarly Service and the Scholarship of Service, in the 2009 publication of ACADEME. The following year Dr. Lee published another article entitled Institutional Core Values: Operationalizing the Constructs in the Journal of Beliefs & Values.

Lee has also participated in over 25 conference presentations since 1990 and is a member of the following professional organizations: American Association of University Professors (AAUP); American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE); Council of Chicago Area Deans of Education (CCADE); and the Mid-Western Educational Research Association (MWERA).

Dr. E. Suzanne Lee grew up in Effingham, Illinois where she attended East Side Elementary, Central Jr. High, and Effingham High School where she graduated in 1980. She has been a resident of Evanston, Illinois since 2002.