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Dr. Richard H. Herman
Chancellor, University of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignDr. Richard Herman is chancellor of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the state’s flagship public research university. Chancellor Herman leads a campus of more than 42,000 students and nearly 3,000 faculty members. As chief executive of a campus with a $1.4 billion budget, he promotes excellence in education through innovation, diversity, public engagement, environmental sustainability, and a global perspective primed for the 21st century. The university is renowned for its interdisciplinary collaborations, advances in human understanding, community outreach, and life-changing scientific developments.
A mathematician, Herman was named chancellor in May 2005. He came to Illinois in 1998 as provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs, the institution’s chief academic and budget officer. His leadership at Illinois has led to an increase in research funding, a more diverse faculty and student body, and strong relationships with universities around the world.
Herman is a well-regarded leader who helps shape national science policy. He consistently stresses the need to better position the sciences to engage the emerging needs of society. He chairs an initiative called the Science and Mathematics Teacher Imperative, sponsored by the National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges, to increase the number of middle and high school science and math teachers.
Herman recently served on President Bush's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST). Currently, Herman serves as Chair of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities' Science and Math Teacher Imperative with the goal of ensuring more and better STEM teachers in grades K-12.
He assists the Council on Competitiveness as co-chair of its High Performance Computing Initiative and as a member of the steering committee for the council's Energy, Security, Innovation and Sustainability Initiative.
Herman served as chair of the Council of Presidents of the Universities Research Association Inc., and currently is a member of the Business-Higher Education Forum. He has served as chair of the Joint Policy Board for Mathematics and as a member of the National Science Foundation's Advisory Committee for the Directorate of Mathematical and Physical Sciences.
In 2008, Herman was elected to the prestigious American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Most recently, Herman received the Michael P. Malone International Leadership Award, sponsored by the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities.
Support for Herman's research on mathematical physics and operator algebras has come from the National Science Foundation and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and through the National Defense Education Act. He is a member of the honorary societies Tau Beta Pi and Sigma Xi.
Herman holds a bachelor's degree from Stevens Institute of Technology; he received his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Maryland in 1967. He taught at UCLA, then joined Pennsylvania State University in 1972, where he was chair of the Department of Mathematics from 1986 to 1990. He served as dean of the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Physical Sciences at Maryland from 1990 to 1998.
Video from the summit: Clearing Obstacles to a National Transmission Superhighway & Smart Grid
