[1][2] White held a joint appointment in the department of sociology and the African American studies research center at Purdue University.
[1][2] From 2011 to 2016, White served as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Simmons University, overseeing undergraduate and graduate programs.
[2][3] White is the author of Putting Risk in Perspective: Black Teenage Lives in the Era of AIDS and the co-author of Spoils of War: Women of Color, Cultures, and Revolutions.
[2] Her professional activities have included a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship in Black film studies and participation as a Wye Faculty Fellow at the Aspen Institute.
She has served on the Vision 2020 National Leadership Circle and the Chief Academic Officers Task Force of the Council of Independent Colleges from 2019 to 2021.