Who

Brown is the president of the Fashion Institute of Technology, the Chelsea school for chic boys and girls who want an entrée into the world of fashion design.

Backstory

Brown started her academic career as a financial aid officer at NYU in the 1960s. After a series of faculty and administrative positions, she became dean of urban affairs at Bernard Baruch College and then acting president in 1990. She moved over to CUNY as vice chancellor a year later, but later left academia to join the Dinkins administration as deputy mayor for public and community affairs. After Dinkins left office, in 1994 Brown re-joined CUNY as a professor of clinical psychology. When she was tapped to succeed Allen Hershfeld as FIT's president in 1998, she became the school's first female and first African-American president.

Personal

Brown is married to H. Carl McCall, the former comptroller of New York who unsuccessfully ran for governor. The couple live on West 27th Street. In a minor scandal several years ago, Brown was criticized for spending $500,000 of FIT's funds to refurbish the 4,254-square-foot penthouse apartment that the school provides for her and McCall.