A longtime business faculty member and academic administrator at Emory and Rutgers universities has been appointed dean of Mercer University's Eugene W. Stetson School of Business and Economics, Mercer Provost D. Scott Davis announced today. Dr. Susan Perles Gilbert, who also spent several years as an executive with AT&T in New Jersey, assumes leadership of Mercer's 1,000-student business school on April 1.
“Dr. Davis and the search committee have done an outstanding job in recruiting an experienced and accomplished dean for our business school,” said Mercer President William D. Underwood. “Dr. Gilbert knows our region well from her previous experience and she has a sterling track record at the institutions she has served. We expect our business school will thrive under her leadership.”
Since 2010 she has served as dean of the School of Business and Technology at Thomas Edison State University in Trenton, N.J., where she helped lead the school to a 14 percent increase in enrollment and launched two new MBA programs. Prior to her tenure at Thomas Edison, Dr. Gilbert was associate dean of the business school at Rutgers, overseeing full-time and part-time MBA programs.
For 20 years Dr. Gilbert served on the faculty and was an associate dean at Emory's Goizueta School of Business, where she won numerous teaching awards, was director of academic programs, and provided academic and administrative oversight for Emory's evening MBA program. From 2001 to 2005 she also chaired the President's Commission on the Status of Women at Emory.
“I am honored to be joining the distinguished faculty and administration of Mercer University, and delighted to be returning to my adopted home state of Georgia,” Dr. Gilbert said. “The Stetson School of Business and Economics is one of several very high-caliber business schools in the Southeast, and I look forward to helping the school raise the bar even higher.”
After earning her Ph.D. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Gilbert began her corporate career at AT&T, working in the marketing strategy and finance departments. She also graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a bachelor's degree in economics from Binghamton University in New York.
“I want to commend the search committee, in particular the chair, Professor Michael Weber, for their diligence and patience in conducting this national search,” said Provost Davis, who has been leading the business school on an interim basis since 2010. “We had a strong pool of candidates, but Dr. Gilbert was the unanimous choice of the committee. She's an excellent teacher, she understands the dynamics of the market for business and executive education, and she is an effective leader. I am very pleased that Dr. Gilbert will be the next dean of the Stetson School of Business and Economics.”
The search committee, chaired by Dr. Weber, associate professor of marketing and director of Stetson's daytime MBA program on the University's Cecil B. Day Campus in Atlanta, also included Ed Baker, publisher of the Atlanta Business Chronicle; Dr. Linda L. Brennan, professor of management and accreditation strategic planning director; Robert F. “Robbo” Hatcher Jr., president of H2 Capital Inc.; Dr. Lake Lambert, dean of the College of Liberal Arts; David Lanier, regional president for BB&T; and Dr. Julie A. Petherbridge, assistant professor of accounting and director of the Master of Accountancy program.
About the Eugene W. Stetson School of Business and Economics at Mercer
Established in 1984, the Eugene W. Stetson School of Business and Economics offers bachelor's, MBA, Professional MBA, Executive MBA and Master of Accountancy degrees. The School holds accreditation from the prestigious AACSB International — The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, considered the hallmark of excellence among the nation's top business schools and placing it among the top 25 percent of all business schools in the world. The Princeton Review recognized the School as No. 3 for “Greatest Opportunity for Women” and one of its “Best 297 Business Schools.”
