Effective June 15, Les Hudson will be joining Penn as Vice Provost for Strategic Initiatives. Hudson, who comes to Penn from Pharmacia Corporation, will guide the University’s technology-transfer and entrepreneurial initiatives as well as corporate relations; integrate Penn’s involvement in regional economic-development initiatives; develop a cohesive approach to commercialization; and oversee the Center for Technology Transfer and the new Office of Corporate and Industrial Relations. Hudson brings both commercial and academic experience to Penn, having led successful research-and-development activities at Pharmacia, Glaxo Wellcome, and Repligen Corporation and served as professor of immunology at St. George’s Hospital Medical School and as a visiting scientist at Harvard Medical School.

Jennifer Snead (C’94) has been chosen to succeed Kerry Sherin Wright as director of the Kelly Writers House. A poet, scholar and teacher, Snead has been a lecturer on the faculty of English at Penn since 2000, teaching courses in poetry and poetics, the novel, and creative writing. She has also previously served as the assistant program coordinator at the Writers House and as a research associate for the School of Arts and Sciences Office of External Affairs. Snead is just completing a term as a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the Penn Humanities Forum.