Mark Schlissel


Mark Steven Schlissel is the president of the University of Michigan. He was named the 14th president of the university on July 1, 2014, following the retirement of Mary Sue Coleman. His initial contract with the University of Michigan lasts five years, expiring in 2019. In addition to his presidency, he holds a professorship of microbiology and immunology and a professorship of internal medicine within the University of Michigan Health System as well as a professorship of molecular, cellular, and developmental biology in the University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts.

Biography

Schlissel was born in Brooklyn, New York in a traditional Jewish household. He graduated from Madison Central High School in 1975 and was inducted into the Hall of Fame of Old Bridge High School in 2017.
He graduated with a BA in Biochemical Sciences from Princeton University in 1979. He earned his MD degree and a PhD in Physiological Chemistry from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 1986 through the Medical Scientist Training Program. His residency in Internal Medicine was conducted at the Johns Hopkins Hospital from 1986-88. His postdoctoral research fellowship was under David Baltimore at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Whitehead Institute.
Schlissel became a faculty member at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 1991. He moved to the Department of Molecular and Cell Biology at UC Berkeley in 1999 as an associate professor, becoming a full professor in 2002. At UC Berkeley he served as Dean of Biological Sciences in the College of Letters & Science from 2008 to 2011. In 2011 he became provost at Brown University.
Schlissel is married to Monica Schwebs, an environmental and energy lawyer, and has four children.

Controversies

The beginning of his career as president of the University of Michigan has involved controversy surrounding the athletics department and a federal investigation into the Brendan Gibbons sexual assault case.
In 2018, John Cheney-Lippold, an associate professor of American culture, declined to write a letter of recommendation for a student applying to study abroad in Israel, citing human rights concerns and his support for the BDS movement. In response, Cheney-Lippold was put on probation, had his pay cut, and had his subsequent vacation days cancelled. The university and Mark Schlissel were criticized for disciplining him, citing a breach of free speech, the right to boycott, and professorial independence.
Mark Schlissel has come into conflict with climate activists over his support for continuing University investment in oil and gas industries. In 2018, in response to continued refusal to meet with climate activists, students organized a sit-in at Mark Schlissel's office in the evening following the Global Climate Strike to demand a 1-hour meeting with Schlissel. In response, University of Michigan Police were called in by an unknown administrative source to disperse the protests. Following repeated warnings, several students were arrested and were subsequently charged with trespassing on university property. There has been a significant backlash to this decision, and there are continued calls for charges to be dropped against the protesters, citing the non-violent nature of the protest, the withholding of evidence by university lawyers, and the fact that the University of Michigan had never previously pursued trespassing charges against students.