Susan M. Collins, dean of the Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, was appointed Wednesday to the board of directors of the Detroit Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
Collins' appointment is effective Jan. 1, 2013. She was appointed to serve an unexpired term that ends Dec. 31, 2014. Collins replaces Brian Walker, president and CEO of Herman Miller Inc. in Zeeland.
Detroit Branch directors contribute to monetary policy development and serve as a link between the Federal Reserve and the private sector.
Collins is the Joan and Sanford Weill Dean of Public Policy and a professor of public policy and economics.
Before coming to Michigan, she was a professor of economics at Georgetown University and a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution. Her area of expertise is international economics, including issues in both macroeconomics and trade.
Her current work explores implications of increasing international economic integration, as well as growth experiences in industrial and developing countries. She recently co-authored studies comparing experiences in China and India, and examined challenges to growth in Puerto Rico.
During 1989-90, she served as a senior staff economist on the President's Council of Economic Advisers. Collins received her BA summa cum laude in Economics from Harvard University and her PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.