The President today announced that he will nominate James R. Schlesinger, of Arlington, Va., to be Secretary of Energy. Schlesinger is Assistant to the President with primary responsibility for energy matters.

He was born February 15, 1929, in New York City. He received an A.B. (1950), an A.M. (1952), and a Ph.D. (1956) in economics from Harvard University.

From 1955 to 1963, he served as assistant and associate professor of economics at the University of Virginia. He was associated with the Rand Corporation as a senior staff member from 1963 to 1967 and as director of strategic studies from 1967 to 1969.

Schlesinger worked for the Bureau of the Budget from 1969 to 1971, serving as Assistant Director and as Acting Director. From 1971 to 1973, he was Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. From February to July 1973, he was Director of Central Intelligence.

From 1973 to 1975, Schlesinger was Secretary of Defense. He was a visiting scholar at Johns Hopkins University from 1975 until December 1976, when then President-elect Carter named him as Assistant to the President for energy matters.

Schlesinger is the author of "The Political Economy of National Security" (1960) and coauthor of "Issues in Defense Economics" (1967). He was associate editor of the Journal of Finance in 1964-65. He has been a member of the board of associates of the Foreign Policy Research Institute at the University of Pennsylvania (1962-63) and a Frederick Sheldon Prize Fellow at Harvard (1950-51).