Financial planning program welcomes two new faculty members

Two new faculty members will join the FACS department of financial planning, housing and consumer economics in spring 2022.

Kimberly Watkins and Lu Fan have been hired as assistant professors, joining the department where both completed their doctorate degrees.

“We are thrilled to welcome Dr. Watkins and Dr. Fan to our department,” FHCE interim department Swarn Chatterjee said. “Both of them boast impressive credentials and have proven themselves to be outstanding researchers and teachers. We believe the hiring of these new faculty members will help us serve the needs of our diverse student body in our rapidly growing financial planning program.”

Watkins, who received her Ph.D. from FACS in 2018 with a concentration in financial planning, currently serves as assistant professor at the University of Alabama College of Human Environmental Sciences.

Her research interests include financial well-being, financial planning pedagogy, financial education and diversity, equity and inclusion in the financial planning field.

She is a member of the Financial Planning Association and teaches personal financial planning and estate planning courses at Alabama.

Watkins received a bachelor’s degree from Florida A&M University and holds a master’s degree in business management from the University of Florida.

Fan, an assistant professor of financial planning at the University of Missouri, holds a CFP^® and received her Ph.D. from FACS in 2017.

Her research focuses on personal financial decision-making, financial advice-seeking and behavioral finance.

At Missouri, she teaches several courses, including investment management, estate and gift planning and computer applications in personal finance, as well as graduate-level theory and research courses.

Fan received a bachelor’s degree from China’s Capital University of Economics and Business and a master’s degree from the UGA Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication with a concentration in advertising.