President Anne E. McCall

Dr. Anne E. McCall is the 13th president of The College of Wooster.

An inspirational and values-driven administrator with a track record for building innovation through inclusive excellence, a dedicated teacher and mentor, and internationally recognized scholar of nineteenth-century French fiction and life writing, President McCall is the second woman to lead Wooster since its founding in 1866. She also is a tenured professor in the Department of French and Francophone Studies.

The announcement of her appointment was made via video on Dec. 8, 2022, which included introductory comments from Peter Sundman ’81, trustee and chair of the presidential search committee, and Chair of the Board of Trustees Sally Staley ’78, as well as statements of support from members of the search committee and the expansive Wooster campus community.

McCall previously was provost and senior vice president of academic affairs at Xavier University of Louisiana—ranked fifth among Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in the U.S. according to U.S. News & World Report and first among all institutions for the number of African American graduates completing medical school and multiple Ph.D. programs. She also was a professor in Xavier’s Department of Languages.

During her seven years at Xavier, McCall collaborated with faculty, staff, students, alumni, and community organizations to create and implement a new core curriculum and nearly two dozen new graduate and undergraduate degree programs in areas of growing student interest, emerging knowledge, and professional opportunities. She also supported the Center for Equity, Justice, and the Human Spirit; inter-university pipeline programs and partnerships, including international partnerships; and a major collaboration with southeast Louisiana’s largest health system.

She led and contributed to successful capital fundraising campaigns and helped to secure grants from the Andrew W. Mellon, W.K. Kellogg, and Kresge foundations, the National Institutes of Health, Department of Education, and the National Science Foundation to support the staffing and infrastructure for much of Xavier’s programmatic growth over the past seven years.

Prior to Xavier, McCall held leadership positions at three other institutions of distinction, including as dean of the Harpur College of Arts and Sciences at Binghamton University from 2013 to 2016; dean of arts, humanities, and social sciences at the University of Denver from 2008 to 2013; and associate dean of the School of Liberal Arts at Tulane University from 2006 to 2008. In each of her prior administrative posts, she was instrumental in developing new interdisciplinary courses and specialized centers, cultivating domestic and global pipeline and programmatic partnerships, leading teams to secure funds for critical initiatives, and expanding opportunities for faculty, staff, and students.

A hallmark of McCall’s career has been her unwavering commitment to inclusive excellence. At Tulane, she served as director of the women’s studies program and co-led a pre-strategic planning group on diversity. At the University of Denver, she created a cohort of ten courses on migrations and diasporas. At Binghamton and Xavier, she has commissioned taskforces to study data, dialogue with colleagues, and make recommendations, many of which have been implemented. Most recently, she oversaw substantial increases in underrepresented minority tenure-track hires at Xavier as well as new cross-college training and programming to support equitable hiring practices and evaluations, professional development opportunities, celebrations, restorative justice trainings, and an NSF Advance-funded initiative to address systemic inequities contributing to a lack of female STEM faculty, particularly female faculty of color.

McCall is committed to nurturing an environment conducive to global learning, and dedicates herself to equity and physical, intellectual, and collective freedom in the U.S. and around the world. As the current Chair of the Steering Committee for the U.S. section of Scholars at Risk, McCall works to support academic freedom and university values around the world by supporting persecuted scholars seeking placements, advocating for the freedom of jailed scholars and practitioners, and promoting more broadly the freedom to think. She is an alumna of the New Orleans Campaign for Equity training and its criminal justice reform cluster.

McCall’s faculty and early administrative career took place largely at Tulane University, where she worked from 1991 to 2008, teaching French and women’s studies and holding the position of program director before becoming associate dean. She also served as a service-learning fellow, participated in NCAA recertification processes, and served in hurricane Katrina recovery efforts while at Tulane.

Trained in French and comparative literature, McCall’s scholarly publications focus on post-Revolutionary French fiction and life-writing, with a noted focus on George Sand. She is past-president of the George Sand Association. Despite a full administrative load, she remains active in her field of scholarship, presenting papers and organizing workshops throughout the U.S. and internationally.

McCall earned a bachelor’s degree in French and German from the University of Virginia and spent nine years in Europe earning a master’s and doctoral degree in French literature from the Université Strasbourg.

Born in Washington, D.C., McCall moved to Cincinnati at age six and attended Clifton Elementary and Walnut Hill High School, with one semester at the American School of Paris.

McCall is married to Ravi Palat, Ph.D. a historical sociologist and political economist at Binghamton University and has three adult children who live in Texas and California with their families. Among the many things she looks forward to after her move to Wooster this summer are campus movie nights, book readings, gallery openings, concerts, plays, and more. She grew up rooting for the Cincinnati Reds and Bengals and University of Cincinnati athletic teams.

For relaxation and personal growth, Anne enjoys world literature and cinema, fine and performing arts, travel, sports, and her family.