Laurie L. Patton

Patton was raised in Danvers, Massachusetts, and graduated from Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, Connecticut. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard University in 1983 and her PhD from the University of Chicago in 1991. She was a Fulbright Scholar at Tel Aviv University in Israel in 1999 and at Deccan College in India in 2000.

She was the Charles Howard Candler Professor of Early Indian Religions at Emory University before becoming the Robert F. Durden Professor of Religion and Dean of Arts and Sciences at Duke University. She was named Middlebury's 17th president on November 18, 2014, and became Middlebury's first woman president upon taking office on July 1, 2015. She completed her service to Middlebury in December 2024 and began her presidency of the American Academy in January 2025.

Patton has taught in public venues nationally and internationally on interfaith issues, comparative religion, and religion and conflict. In 2008 and 2009 she co-hosted a TV series on "Faith and Feminism" for Atlanta Interfaith Broadcasting. She served as department chair from 2000 to 2007 and as conveyor of the Religions and the Human Spirit Strategic Plan from 2005 to 2007, and as the Winship Distinguished Research Professor from 2003 to 2006. She received Emory's highest award for teaching, the Emory Williams Award, in 2006.