COLS Update

Phyllis Wise is a leader in higher education and biomedical researcher. She recently accepted the position of Chief Executive Officer of the Colorado Longitudinal Study, an ambitious project to create the largest repository in the world of biological specimens and corresponding data on the social determinants of health.

Phyllis has previously served as chief executive officer and chief academic and budgetary officer at pre-eminent research universities, including the University of Washington and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has been a passionate advocate for public research universities and the role they must play in meeting society’s greatest global challenges. With over thirty years of research funding from the National Institutes of Health, among other funding agencies, Phyllis’s research focused on issues of women’s health and how hormones influence learning and memory and protect the brain against neurodegeneration.

Phyllis has significant corporate and foundation board experience and currently serves on the NIKE and the First Busey Corporation Boards of Directors. In the non-profit sector, she serves on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Board of Directors and the RAND Health Board of Advisors. She was recognized as a “Woman of Influence” by the Puget Sound Business Journal and has received several awards that recognize her leadership in education including the Asian Pacific Americans in Higher Education Leadership Award and the Chang-Lin Tien Educational Leadership Award.

Phyllis received her bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore College and her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. She holds honorary degrees from Swarthmore College and the University of Birmingham (England). She is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.