Kirkland House Resident Dean David A. Smith will be replaced by Cory T. Way at the end of this year, Kirkland House Masters Tom C. and Verena A. Conley announced in an email to the Kirkland House community yesterday.

Smith wrote in an email to the Crimson that he will miss Kirkland’s vibrant community and annual traditions, including housing day, humans vs. zombies, and Secret Santa week.

After three years as resident dean, he will be returning to Canada to accept a tenure-track appointment in history at Wilfrid Laurier University, which is near Toronto.

He said that he plans on completing his first book on English law and developing a project on the multiracial experience in the English Atlantic world.

Way, who will assume Smith’s role in July, is currently a Fellow in the Program on the Legal Profession at Harvard Law School.

He graduated from Princeton in 1990 with a bachelor’s degree in International and Public Affairs and received a doctorate from the University of Oxford.

He has practiced law at firms in New York City and Washington, D.C., and has served as a law clerk to Karen L. Henderson, a federal judge for the District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

His doctoral thesis, “Nothing Beats a Stunning Good Murder: Crime News in England and America,” will soon be in print, according to the announcement.

The Conleys also praised Way’s previous experiences as Dean of Student Welfare at Merton College, Oxford, and Assistant Dean at Corpus Christie College of the University of Cambridge.

—Staff writer Monika L. S. Robbins can be reached at mrobbins@college.harvard.edu.