A message from Deep Saini, Principal and Vice-Chancellor, McGill University

(SOURCE: McGill University)

Dear members of the McGill community,

It is my pleasure to announce the appointment of Dr. Lesley Fellows as the next Vice-Principal (Health Affairs) and Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr. Fellows’ five-year, renewable term will begin on August 1, 2023, and end July 31, 2028. The Advisory Committee for the Selection of the Vice-Principal (Health Affairs) and Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences conducted an extensive search within Canada and internationally, which benefitted from regular input from the McGill community. The McGill University Board of Governors accepted the Committee’s recommendation at its regular meeting on April 20, 2023.

Dr. Fellows joined McGill’s Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences (FMHS) in 2004 and is currently a Full Professor in the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, as well as a Neurologist at the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital (The Neuro) and the Royal Victoria Hospital at the McGill University Health Centre. Over the years, she has served the Faculty in various leadership positions, first as Chair of the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery from 2010-2013, then as the Faculty’s Assistant Dean (Academic Affairs) from 2016 to 2018, and most recently as Vice-Dean (Academic Affairs) since 2018.

Through her years of leadership experience, Dr. Fellows has developed extensive knowledge of the operations of the FMHS, as well as a keen appreciation of the challenges and opportunities facing the Faculty, its clinical partners and affiliated research institutes, and McGill more generally. She has worked to enhance mentorship and leadership development, and to encourage and recognize academic excellence across the varied missions of the Faculty. She has also played an instrumental role in developing policies and implementing processes within the Faculty that support and advance equity, diversity, and inclusion.

A widely respected scientist and an experienced clinician, Dr. Fellows leads a fundamental research program on the neuroscience of decision-making, as well as interdisciplinary clinical research on brain health in aging and chronic disease. She also heads the Neuro’s Cognitive Neuroscience research group and is the Theme 3 lead for McGill’s Healthy Brains for Healthy Lives CFREF.

Dr. Fellows holds a Bachelor of Science in physiology and a medical degree from McGill University. She completed her Neurology residency at McGill as well, followed by post-doctoral training at the University of Pennsylvania. A Rhodes Scholar, she earned a DPhil in neurophysiology from the University of Oxford. In 2021, she was appointed a Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.

Please join me in congratulating Dr. Fellows on her new appointment. I also take this opportunity to thank Dr. David Eidelman for his dedicated service and important contributions while serving in this role for over a decade. Finally, thanks are due to the members of the Advisory Committee and to everyone in the community who shared their comments and advice during the search process.

APRIL 21, 2023