Purdue trustees ratify distinguished faculty and new named deanship, approve new academic programs and name changes

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — The Purdue University Board of Trustees on Friday (Feb. 8) approved several actions, including the ratification of four faculty positions, the creation of two new master’s degree programs, changes to the titles of two graduate programs, the purchase of a property adjacent to campus and a resolution of appreciation for friends of the university.

Details of the actions include:

* Charles M. Krousgrill was appointed the Tebbe Family 150th Anniversary Professor in Mechanical Engineering, Robin Stryker was ratified as a Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Mung Chiang was named the Roscoe H. George Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Krousgrill was named a 150th Anniversary Professor by the Office of the Provost in January 2018. He is a national and international leader in mechanical engineering and has received more than $2 million in mechanical engineering teaching development grants from the National Science Foundation, AT&T Foundation, GE Foundation, Amoco Foundation and Hewlett-Packard. He has received numerous teaching awards, including the Charles B. Murphy Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching, Purdue’s highest undergraduate teaching honor. The Tebbe Family professorship is named for Stanley Tebbe, a 1967 graduate of mechanical engineering and a 1968 graduate of the Krannert School of Management.

Stryker is an award-winning, internationally renowned scholar in the fields of sociology of law, political sociology and comparative and historical sociology, with emphasis on voting rights, equal employment opportunity, fair housing and global human rights. She received a Jean Monnet Fellowship in 2001, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2008 and a Center for Advanced Study in Behavioral Sciences Fellowship at Stanford University in 2016, three of the most prestigious awards for social science scholars. Her work is regularly published in her field’s top peer-reviewed journals.

Chiang is the John A. Edwardson Dean of the College of Engineering, which he has been leading toward its goal of reaching the pinnacle of excellence at scale since joining Purdue in July 2017. His research in networks has been cited 22,000 times and received the Alan T. Waterman Award, IEEE Tomiyasu Award and Guggenheim Fellowship. His online courses and textbooks have reached 400,000 people. The holder of 21 patents, he co-founded three startup companies in edge computing and artificial intelligence, and is the only academic member on the board of the global Industrial Internet Consortium.

*The board also ratified David Hummels as the Dr. Samuel R. Allen Dean of the Krannert School of Management, the result of a generous $5 million gift  from Samuel Allen, chairman and chief executive officer of Deere & Co., and a 1975 Purdue graduate in industrial management. In addition to the named deanship, Allen’s gift will also provide resources for strategic initiatives within the school.

* Following trustees approval, two new master’s programs are available to students on two of Purdue’s regional campuses. In Fort Wayne, the new Speech Language Pathology master’s program is the first graduate program to be offered by the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders in the campus’ College of Arts and Sciences. Following board approval, the program awaits approval from the Indiana Commission for Higher Education and accreditation from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association and the Indiana Department of Education.

 At Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, graduate students in the School of Science can now pursue a Master of Science in computational data science. Also with effect on the IUPUI campus, the board approved renaming the Master of Science (M.S.) in Interdisciplinary Engineering program to the M.S. in Engineering program and the Master of Science in Engineering (M.S.E) in Interdisciplinary Engineering program to M.S.E. in Engineering.

* The board also authorized the purchase of University Church from the Purdue Research Foundation, which aligns with the Giant Leaps Master Plan. Located at 320 North St., near the Purdue Memorial Union, the space is currently home to the Anvil, a student-run co-working space, and the Korean Software (K-SW) Square project, a collaboration between Purdue’s Department of Computer and Information Technology, the Purdue Foundry and the South Korean Institute for Information and Communications Technology Promotion.

* In other action, trustees issued a resolution of appreciation for those who have recently contributed $1 million or more to the university. Friends include Mary J. Elmore, to support the College of Science; Mark and Sandra Shambaugh, to support student scholarships; Sam and Marsha Allen, to support the Krannert School of Management; Rick and Anne Borch, to support the College of Pharmacy; Bill and Jane Keene, to support the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering; Anonymous, to support the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics; Anonymous, to support the College of Veterinary Medicine; and Anonymous, to support the Davidson School of Chemical Engineering. 

Sources: Amy Noah, arnoah@purdue.edu

Michael B. Cline, 765-494-8000, mbcline@purdue.edu

Charles Krousgrill, krousgri@purdue.edu

Robin Stryker, rstryker@purdue.edu

Mung Chiang, chiang@purdue.edu