LSU President William F. Tate IV Elected to the Prestigious American Academy of Arts & Sciences

Tate joins the likes of Benjamin Franklin, Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King Jr., Condoleezza Rice, among others 

BATON ROUGE – LSU President William F. Tate IV is among the world’s most accomplished scholars, scientists, writers, artists as well as civic, business and philanthropic leaders elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Tate joins other experts who are exploring the challenges facing society and identifying solutions that address issues of importance to the nation and the world.

“It is an honor to be selected alongside some of history’s greatest scientists, artists and leaders who have advocated for public good during their lifetimes,” Tate said. “The research tenets of the Academy of Arts & Sciences are what I’ve been striving for in my career as well, and since I arrived at LSU, they match the goals that we’ve outlined in our Scholarship First Agenda for Louisiana.”

For more than 240 years, the Academy has been electing and engaging exceptional individuals. This year’s election of 261 new members continues a tradition of recognizing accomplishments and leadership in academia, the arts, industry, public policy and research.

“We are celebrating a depth of achievements in a breadth of areas,” said David Oxtoby, president of the American Academy. “These individuals excel in ways that excite us and inspire us at a time when recognizing excellence, commending expertise, and working toward the common good is absolutely essential to realizing a better future.”

Tate joins others affiliated with LSU elected to the Academy: Gabriela González (2017), Isiah Warner (2016), Earl Ward Plummer (2014), Meredith Blackwell (2012), Lewis P. Simpson (2005), James Olney (2001) and Mary Jane West-Eberhard (1996), who was elected during her time at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. 

Tate earned a Bachelor of Science in economics with a minor in mathematical sciences from Northern Illinois University, Master of Arts in mathematical sciences education from the University of Texas at Dallas, and a Ph.D. in mathematics education with a cognate in human development from the University of Maryland, College Park. Subsequently, he was awarded the Anna Julia Cooper post-doctoral fellowship to study social and public policy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He completed a second postdoctoral fellowship at the Washington University School of Medicine, where he earned the Master of Psychiatric Epidemiology degree.

Tate’s research has focused on the social determinants of mathematics performance, STEM attainment, and the development of epidemiological and geospatial models to explain the social determinants of educational attainment as well as health and developmental outcomes. At LSU, Tate has introduced the Scholarship First Agenda, which focuses on five areas to help better the lives of citizens of Louisiana. 

Prior to being named LSU president, Tate served as Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost at the University of South Carolina. Prior to that, he was dean of the Graduate School & Vice Provost for Graduate Education at Washington University in St. Louis from 2002 to 2020. Tate also spent time at Texas Christian University and University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The complete list of individuals elected in 2022, including 37 International Honorary Members from 16 countries, is online HERE.

The new members join a distinguished group of individuals elected to the Academy before them, including Benjamin Franklin (elected 1781) and Alexander Hamilton (1791) in the 18th century; Ralph Waldo Emerson (1864), Maria Mitchell (1848), and Charles Darwin (1874) in the 19th; Albert Einstein (1924), Robert Frost (1931), Margaret Mead (1948), Milton Friedman (1959), Martin Luther King Jr. (1966), Stephen Jay Hawking (1984), and Condoleezza Rice (1997) in the 20th; and more recently Jennifer Doudna (2003), Bryan Stevenson (2014), M. Temple Grandin (2016), John Legend (2017), Viet Thanh Nguyen (2018), James Fallows (2019), Joan Baez (2020), and Sanjay Gupta (2021).

“The Academy was founded on the belief that the new republic should honor truly accomplished individuals and engage them in meaningful work,” said Nancy C. Andrews, chair of the Academy’s Board of Directors. “The Academy’s dual mission continues to this day. Membership is an honor, and also an opportunity to shape ideas and influence policy in areas as diverse as the arts, democracy, education, global affairs and science.”

The American Academy of Arts & Sciences, founded in 1780, is both an honorary society that recognizes and celebrates the excellence of its members and an independent research center convening leaders from across disciplines, professions, and perspectives to address significant challenges. Learn more at amacad.org.