Dr. Kay M. Palan is the ninth dean of the Culverhouse College of Business at The University of Alabama.

Dr. Palan has served as dean and professor of marketing at Western Michigan University’s Haworth College of Business from 2010 through June 2016. She has more than 25 years of experience in academics, including a six-year stint as associate dean for undergraduate programs at Iowa State University.

Dr. Palan began her academic career as a teaching/research assistant at Texas Tech University, where she earned her doctorate in business in 1994. She served as an assistant professor of marketing at Iowa State from 1994-2000 and as an associate professor from 2000-2010. She served as interim associate dean for undergraduate programs for two years at Iowa State before her selection as associate dean in 2006.

She earned a Master of Business Administration from Minnesota State University Moorhead and a Bachelor of Science in nursing from Winona State University.

Dr. Palan also has industry experience as executive director at Health Enterprises in Fargo, North Dakota and as director of the Traill County Nursing Services in Hillsboro, North Dakota.

She is a member of the initial accreditation committee for the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business and she serves on the editorial review board for Case Research Journal. She is past chair of the AACSB affinity group, Women Administrators in Management Education and past chair of the Mid-American Business Deans’ Association.