Shanna Stoddard named St. Jude Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences Associate Dean of Academic Affairs

Dr. Shana Stoddard has been named the first Associate Dean of Academic Affairs in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. She completed her postdoctoral training at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in the Department of Radiological Sciences/Diagnostic Imaging developing PET radiotracer to detect patient’s cancers. A nationally recognized scholar in biomedical sciences and leader in STEM education, mentorship, and academic innovation, Dr. Stoddard will work closely with the Dean Steven Varga and Sr. Associate Dean Stacey Schultz-Cherry to advance academic programs, enhance student success, and develop and consider new academic opportunities such as the integration of AI and other up and coming innovations into our graduate program curricula.

“We are excited to welcome Dr. Stoddard to the Graduate School’s senior leadership team where she will play a critical role in working alongside faculty and Graduate School staff in advancing the student experience as we continue to improve each of our graduate programs,” says Dean Varga.

Dr. Stoddard brings more than a decade of experience in higher education, most recently serving at Rhodes College, where she earned early tenure. During her time at Rhodes, she held several inaugural and founding roles, including serving as the inaugural Director for Student Mentoring in the Office of Faculty Development and as the Founding Director of the STEM Cohort Mentoring Program (The STEM Cohort^®). She is also an alumna of the American Association of Colleges & Universities Project Kaleidoscope STEM Leadership Institute and was a 2025–2026 LMI Mellon Fellow, a prestigious program designed to prepare future senior academic leaders.

Stoddard has mentored and trained 480 students in biomedical research, including 113 students in her Molecular Immunotherapeutics Research Lab and 367 students through course-based undergraduate research experiences, which she developed. Her pioneering research integrated computational and experimental approaches to understand protein structure, develop optimization guidelines for drug compounds, produce advancements in multi-domain protein modeling and is centered on applications in cancer, neurological diseases, autoimmune disorders, and infectious diseases including COVID-19. Dr. Stoddard’s research has resulted in 13 publications advancing options for molecular imaging tools, therapeutics, bio-tool development, and prediction of multi-domain homology models of tandem repeat proteins.

Her contributions to scholarship, mentorship, teaching, and inclusive excellence have earned her numerous national honors, such as the 2021 Outstanding Mentor of the Year Award (Health Sciences Division), the 2022 Henry C. McBay Outstanding Teaching Award, the 2023 Silvia Ronco Innovative Mentor Award, the 2024 Lloyd N. Ferguson Young Scientist Award, induction into Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Honor Society in 2024, and in 2025 she was named an ACS Trailblazer as a Chemist with a disability.

“I am truly excited to join a dynamic team forging pathways to train the next generation of biomedical scientist who will advance cures for catastrophic diseases globally. I am also genuinely humbled to return to St. Jude in this role,” says Stoddard.

Dr. Stoddard holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and Biochemistry from the University of Mississippi and a Master’s degree in Education in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Special Education from Freed-Hardeman University. She earned her undergraduate degree in Chemistry at Prairie View A&M University and is currently pursuing an Ed.D. in Educational Leadership at Northern Kentucky University.