Law professor Paul Haagen was elected Feb. 17 to serve a two-year term as chair of the Academic Council, beginning July 1. Haagen, who has been a longtime member of the council and recently served a term on its executive committee, outpolled biomedical engineer Roger Barr in a secret ballot. He will succeed Dr. Nancy Allen, professor of rheumatology/medicine. Allen served an unusual three-year term, extending her normal time in office by one year to help the university during a transition in senior leadership. Much of what we will be doing will involve the development of initiatives already underway relating to the Building on Excellence strategic plan," Haagen said. "Some will involve major new initiatives like the Central Campus, which will affect the look of and possibilities for Duke for years to come. Some will be thrust on the university by economic and budgetary forces beyond Duke." Haagen joined the Duke faculty in 1985 after practicing law and clerking on the U.S. Court of Appeals in Philadelphia. He earned a Ph.D. in history from Princeton and a J.D. from Yale. He currently teaches legal history, contracts and sports law in the law school and has taught an undergraduate first-year seminar in constitutional history. While on the Duke faculty, Haagen has been active on several key university committees. He has served on the Faculty Compensation Committee and the 1993 task force that initiated several changes to encourage a stronger intellectual climate at Duke. He also has been a leader on athletics issues at Duke and served as the faculty's first liaison to the Coalition of Intercollegiate Athletics, a national organization of faculty members looking to reform college athletics. "One of Duke's great strengths has been its tradition of faculty governance," he said. "It is a tradition that has permitted this institution to foster a spirit of cooperative engagement, and to avoid the sorts of conflicts that have plagued other institutions. I look forward to working with the entire administration in that spirit." He is the first member of the law faculty to chair the council since Robert Mosteller was elected to the position in 1998.