Professor of Chemistry Richard Prigodich was appointed Interim Dean of the Faculty in January of 2013. Reporting to the President, he is the chief academic officer and the second ranking officer of the College.
Prigodich has been a member of the Trinity faculty since 1985. He served as chair of the Chemistry Department from 1994 until 2005, during which time he initiated semester-long research seminar and summer research programs for undergraduate students, increased departmental student advising sessions, and oversaw the acquisition of several major additions to the department’s capital equipment inventory.
He also has a long history of leadership and service at the College with regard to shaping academic curriculum. He served on the Science Alliance Steering Committee for six years and acted as interim director for one year; he was co-chair of the faculty/trustee Special Committee on Institutional Administration and Governance; he served on the Curriculum Committee for eleven years and as chair for one year; he was a founding member of the Math Center Advisory Committee; and he was instrumental in the establishment of the Interdisciplinary Science Program and the Environmental Science Program. He has also served on the Faculty Research Committee, Educational Policy Committee, and Appointments and Promotions Committee.
Prigodich graduated from Lake Forest College, following which he worked for several years with deaf-blind children and students with learning disabilities before returning to academia. He received his Ph.D. in physical organic chemistry from Wesleyan University in 1982, and from 1982-85 he was a National Institutes of Health Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry Department at Yale University.