Chancellor selects Cangellaris as next vice chancellor for academic affairs

11/20/2017 Robin Kaler, Illinois News Bureau

Pending approval by the University of Illinois Board of Trustees, Andreas Cangellaris will begin January 16 as the next vice chancellor for academic affairs and provost.

Written by Robin Kaler, Illinois News Bureau

Photo by L. Brian Stauffer
Photo by L. Brian Stauffer
Andreas C Cangellaris, the dean of the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and M.E. Van Valkenburg Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering, has been selected by Chancellor Robert Jones to be the campus’s next vice chancellor for academic affairs and provost, pending approval by the University of Illinois Board of Trustees.

Cangellaris is slated to start in his new role January 16.

“Dean Cangellaris has earned an international reputation for excellence as an academic leader, a teacher and a researcher,” Jones said. “His career here at Illinois has provided him with the vast institutional knowledge and with the deep personal connections with faculty members, staff and students. This is a combination that no one else in our pool of candidates could match, and is what made him such a clear and outstanding choice to be our next vice chancellor for academic affairs and provost. I’m excited to start working with him in this new role.”

Cangellaris has provided critical campus leadership around a number of major interdisciplinary initiatives and programs. He was among the core group of faculty and administrators who developed the vision that has led to the new Carle Illinois College of Medicine. He was among the initial collaborators in laying the groundwork and securing the private gift for the Siebel Center for Design, which will break ground in spring 2018. Cangellaris has been instrumental in developing new research, educational and engagement partnerships that range from Chicago to Singapore to mainland China. As a Provost Fellow, Cangellaris led efforts to revise campus promotion and tenure processes.

Cangellaris has served in his current role since 2013. The College of Engineering instructs more than 7,500 undergraduate and about 3,000 graduate students, and the dean administers an annual budget of $265 million. During his tenure as dean, the number of women and traditionally underrepresented undergraduate students increased by more than 55 percent.

“I am honored and humbled to be entrusted by Chancellor Jones and our university community with this responsibility, and I am thrilled at the prospect of how much we can continue to accomplish,” Cangellaris said. “Illinois’ 150-year history shines bright through its people, their work, their service and their contributions. The opportunity to amplify this brilliance in the coming years is an inspiration. We are eager to lend ourselves to the task at hand.  We will double our efforts at what we do best – recruit, retain, educate, discover, innovate, serve and lead. The challenges are many, both local and global.  But we have the will to engage with them, and the passion and talent to overcome them. When Illinois rises, the world advances.”

Cangellaris earned a PhD in electrical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 1985, having previously completed a master’s degree in electrical engineering at the Berkeley campus and an electrical engineering degree at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.

Over the course of his 30-year academic career, Cangellaris’ focus has been on the fields of applied and computational electromagnetics; stochastic, multidomain physics modeling; and system-level electromagnetic compatibility. In addition to supervising 47 master’s students and 28 doctoral candidates, he has authored or co-written more than 280 referred journal and conference publications, and has led the development of several prototype tools for computer-aided analysis and design of RF, microwave and high-speed digital electronic systems.

He arrived at the Urbana campus in 1997 as a professor of electrical and computer engineering after serving as an assistant and then associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Arizona.

He previously served as head of the department of electrical and computer engineering. He continues to hold the position of M.E. Van Valkenburg Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

John Wilkin has served as the interim vice chancellor for academic affairs and provost since February 18, following Edward Feser’s departure from the interim leadership role to take a job with Oregon State University.

A national search headed by Vikram Amar, the dean of the College of Law, produced a field of candidates narrowed to four finalists for Jones’ consideration. The four made presentations in September and October that were open to the campus community.

Jones said an interim dean of the College of Engineering will be named in the coming weeks.


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This story was published November 20, 2017.