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New faculty hiring remains strong
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“This continued success in attracting so many outstanding new full-time faculty to UB is great news for the university, and a compelling sign that the commitment to enhancing academic excellence, which is at the heart of UB 2020, remains as strong as ever.”
Despite the difficult financial times and legislative setbacks in Albany, UB 2020 continues to shape the university’s future with the hiring of 57 new full-time, tenured or tenure-track faculty members for the 2010-11 academic year.
The new faculty members come from a variety of disciplines, ranging from architecture, the humanities and the sciences to law, engineering and medicine.
More than one-third of the new faculty members are “strategic strength” hires; others were hired to enhance departmental or programmatic areas of excellence, or to address needs for particular areas of programmatic or scholarly expertise.
The number of new faculty members hired this year may be a bit higher than last year’s number, notes Lucinda M. Finley, professor of law and vice provost for faculty affairs.
“This continued success in attracting so many outstanding, new full-time faculty to UB is great news for the university, and a compelling sign that the commitment to enhancing academic excellence, which is at the heart of UB 2020, remains as strong as ever,” Finley says.
While the Public Higher Education and Innovation Act (PHEEIA) stalled this summer in the state Legislature, the idea behind it—UB 2020—continues to play a role in bringing faculty to campus, she stresses.
“A core part of the UB 2020 vision has always been about attracting outstanding scholars and educators to UB, so in that regard, all new faculty hiring is about advancing the academic excellence that is at the heart of UB 2020,” she explains. “Many of the new faculty with whom I met during the recruitment process said that the vibrant interdisciplinary research programs and collegial connections that happen because of the UB 2020 strategic strengths were an important reason why they were attracted to UB.”
Finley notes that all the new hires emerged as top candidates “after rigorous national and even international searches, with numerous applicants.” Most joined the faculty as assistant professors after graduate or post-graduate work with leading researchers at top universities. Several came to UB as full professors with tenure, “leaving other top universities to come here because of our strengths and strong reputation in their areas,” she adds.
The full professors include Joseph Valente, a leading James Joyce scholar; Kim Connolly, a national environmental law expert; Eckhard Krotscheck, a renowned theoretical physicist who will join UB in January; Davina Porock, an international researcher in palliative care and geriatrics who is serving as associate dean for research and scholarship in the School of Nursing; and Chunchi Wu, a leading analyst of financial markets who was hired as the M&T Professor of Banking and Finance in the Department of Finance and Managerial Economics, School of Management.
Also, neurologist Lawrence Wrabetz, an expert in the molecular genetics of myelination who is heading UB’s Hunter James Kelly Research Institute; Laura Feltri, a biochemist specializing in developmental processes that link cell differentiation to tissue morphogenesis; and Anne B. Curtis, a world renowned clinical researcher in cardiac electrophysiology who is serving as the inaugural Mary and Charles Bauer Professor and chair of the Department of Medicine, School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
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