Release Date: October 29, 2003 This content is archived.
ALBANY, N.Y. -- The State University of New York Board of Trustees yesterday unanimously voted to name John Barclay Simpson president of the University at Buffalo. Simpson is currently executive vice chancellor and provost of the University of California, Santa Cruz. Prior to that he had a 23-year teaching, research and administrative career at the University of Washington in Seattle, where he was dean of the College of Arts and Sciences from 1994-98. The College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Washington has an enrollment of 18,000 undergraduate and 3,500 graduate students.
"I am delighted that John Simpson is the new president of the University at Buffalo," said Board Chair Thomas F. Egan. "His academic and administrative achievements at the University of California and the University of Washington make him superbly qualified to head this fine institution and I am confident Dr. Simpson will significantly improve an already great institution."
"At this time I would like to extend my deep appreciation to President Greiner for his lifetime commitment to UB and his many and varied accomplishments as a professor, dean, provost and as president of UB. I wish Bill, Carol and the Greiner family the very best."
"I congratulate John Simpson becoming the 14th president of the University at Buffalo and I look forward to working with him as we move the state university to the very front rank of public higher education in America," said Chancellor Robert L. King.
"I want to thank Bill Greiner and his wife Carol for their enormous contributions and life-long commitment to UB. Thanks in large measure to Bill, UB serves all New York as an institution of academic excellence, community service and as an economic engine. Bill, Carol and the Greiner family carry with them my very best wishes."
"I am deeply honored the Board of Trustees has chosen me to lead the University at Buffalo, said Simpson. "I would like to thank the UB search committee, the UB Council and Chancellor King for their efforts in putting my name forward for consideration. I look forward to fulfilling the Board's Trust and raising the University at Buffalo to new levels of excellence."
The University at Buffalo is a premier research-intensive public university. UB's more than 27,000 undergraduate, graduate and professional students pursue their academic interests through more than 100 undergraduate programs, 112 master's programs and 98 doctoral-level programs. It offers the only degrees in law, pharmacy and architecture in the SUNY system, and is the home of the only comprehensive public school of engineering in New York State. UB's athletic teams compete at the NCAA Division I level.
At UC Santa Cruz, he has been the chief academic and budgetary officer as this campus of the University of California has grown from less than 11,000 students to its present size of nearly 15, 000 students. This period marked a number of new graduate programs such as digital arts and news media, bioinformatics, electrical engineering, politics, and an innovative Ed.D. degree with San Jose State University. These developments were framed by a campus-wide long-term strategic planning process, completed under Simpson's leadership as provost.
Simpson experienced considerable success as a research scientist and instructor prior to entering administration. During his term as dean of arts and sciences at the University of Washington, he guided that college through significant budget reductions while fostering innovations in interdisciplinary programs, such as the creation of an excellent Center for the Humanities.
A graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara, Simpson received master's and doctoral degrees in neurobiology and behavior from Northwestern University. Before going to the University of Washington, he was a research associate and fellow at the University of Pennsylvania from 1973-75. He also has been a visiting professor of physiology at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine and Howard Florey Institute of Experimental Physiology and Medicine at the University of Melbourne, Australia.
The State University of New York is the largest comprehensive university system in the United States educating more than 410,000 students in 6,650 degree and certificate programs on 64 campuses. To learn more about how SUNY creates opportunity, visit http://www.suny.edu.
