Chancellor Gary S. May has appointed history professor Gregory Downs as faculty athletics representative in 2023, a position required by the NCAA to oversee issues related to student-athlete welfare and to protect the academic integrity of the institution as it pertains to intercollegiate athletics.
Downs went to Yale, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and volunteering as a basketball coach at a local school, Hillhouse High. Later in life he coached junior high school and high school basketball in Tennessee and Massachusetts.
Â
In his academic life, he went on to earn a Master of Arts degree and Ph.D. in history, the former from Northwestern University, the latter from the University of Pennsylvania. He taught at the City University of New York's City College and Graduate Center before joining UC Davis as an associate professor in 2015.
Â
According to his faculty page, he studies the political and cultural history of the United States in the 19th and early 20th centuries, in particular the transformative impact of the Civil War, the end of slavery and the role of military force in establishing new meanings of freedom.
Â
He is the author of several books on the Civil War, including The Second American Revolution: The Civil War-Era Struggle Over Cuba and the Rebirth of the American Republic (2019). As a public historian, he co-wrote the National Park Service's "Theme Study on Reconstruction" and helped edit the park service's handbook on Reconstruction.
