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PRESIDENT’S COUNCIL

Purdue University Names Chiang Its Next President

The Purdue Board of Trustees announced today (June 10) its unanimous election of Dr. Mung Chiang, currently the John A. Edwardson Dean of Engineering and Executive Vice President for Strategic Initiatives, as the university’s next president. Dr. Chiang will replace current president Mitch Daniels effective Jan. 1, 2023. Daniels has served since January 2013.

During Chiang’s five years at Purdue, he has led his college to its highest rankings ever, even as it has grown dramatically at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Purdue is currently ranked No. 4 among graduate programs, No. 3 for online programs, and No. 10 for undergraduate education, and is the largest undergraduate program in the nation’s top 10. Both government and industry-sponsored research funding have set new records, as do the 12 national research centers now housed at the university.

Meanwhile, Chiang has played a central role in establishing new relationships with federal agencies in the national security and economic development sectors, and in recruiting new companies to invest and create jobs in Purdue’s Discovery Park District. He spent 2020 as scientific and technology advisor to the U.S. secretary of state on a prestigious Intergovernmental Personnel Act appointment.

Chiang earned a B.S. (Hons.) in electrical engineering and mathematics, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Stanford University. He came to Purdue from Princeton University, where in his role as the Arthur LeGrand Professor of Electrical Engineering, he was recognized for a number of innovations in teaching and was the first chairman of Princeton’s Entrepreneurial Council. The holder of 25 patents, he founded three companies and was named New Jersey’s CEO of the Year in 2014. Among many other academic honors, Chiang received the Alan T. Waterman Award in 2013 as the nation’s top scientist under the age of 40 for his excellence in edge computing, internet congestion, cloud and video optimization, and other research areas. Chiang’s research publications have received over 30,000 citations with an H-index of 81. He has graduated more than 50 Ph.D. students and postdocs, including 24 who have become faculty in research universities. His full biography can be read on the Purdue University College of Engineering website.

Chiang will lead a transition of his duties as dean, while continuing his strategic initiatives assignment.

Board of Trustees Chairman Michael Berghoff said, “Mung is the ideal choice to lead Purdue into its next ‘giant leap.’ The board could not be more confident in this selection, as we have had the opportunity to observe his performance across a broad range of duties for five years.

“He has displayed not only academic excellence but also administrative acumen, effective relationship-building with academic, governmental, and business partners, and the skills of public communications. He brings the entire package of talents and experience necessary to take our university further forward. It is no surprise that Mung has been offered the presidency of several other schools, and the board is grateful that his loyalty to Purdue kept him here and available as this time of transition arrived.”

Berghoff thanked President Daniels for his service, saying, “The last decade has seen Purdue attain unprecedented levels of national recognition, reflected in record enrollments, academic rankings, and overall reputation.

Statement from Dr. Mung Chiang
“It is the highest and most humbling honor to be selected by the Board of Trustees as the next president of Purdue University: the unique and most remarkable land grant institution in the land of the free. Throughout the past 153 years, and spanning from Wabash River to the Moon, generations of Boilermakers contributed to our state, to our country, and to humanity in immeasurable ways. There is no other place like Purdue.

“And there is no other university leader like ours. President Daniels and the outstanding team built Purdue into the most consequential public university in the United States. Under Mitch’s transformational leadership, our university attained the strongest academic reputation, from record-breaking enrollment to all-time-high research excellence, from the Ever True campaign to the transformed campus. Purdue led the country in safely reopening during the pandemic, while its financial foundation is fortified stronger than ever before. But there’s even more. Mitch is also the most innovative president in America: affordability through tuition freeze, 21st century land grant through Purdue Global, and economic growth in Indiana through entrepreneurship and the Discovery Park District in West Lafayette.

“The amazing success of the Daniels’ Decade must continue. While my family and I are blessed with the pride of gold and black, I’m also humbled by a daunting task: to ensure the continuity of today’s momentum into the next giant leaps. I’ve had the privilege to be a part of the Purdue team in the past five years, and to grow the range of service as an EVP, but there’s much more that I need to keep learning, like a student, from each of you. In the next seven months and beyond, my responsibilities start with listening, to students, faculty, staff, alumni, neighbors, and state, national and global partners, to all friends and families of Purdue.

“Neil Armstrong said, “Knowledge is fundamental to all human achievement and progress.” A university creates a time when lives are lifted by student access and success. My own life was lifted out of scarcity because of education. A university preserves a place for all minds in pursuit of open inquiry. And I’m ever grateful for the honor to dedicate myself in service of the talents at our university. As an immigrant living the American dream and as a citizen of this greatest nation in human history, I am also proud to serve, in higher education as I did in the U.S. State Department, the best hope for freedom and opportunity in the ‘shining city on a hill.’

“Opportunities and challenges are intensifying for American higher education, from the modality and value of learning to R&D investment by the government and private sector. We are confident that the entire Purdue system, across all campuses and all units, will innovate together and excel together: one brick at a time, toward boundless potential in the Boilermaker future.

“Hail Our Purdue!”

Media contact: Tim Doty, doty2@purdue.edu

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Keagan’s story

I’m walking with Grandparents University tour group near the steps of Hovde Hall. It’s a Thursday morning in July, and the only students around are between the ages of 7 and 14. I catch a snippet of a conversation between a grandmother and her grandson as she details the pranks she pulled with her friends around this area.

I smile because just a few months ago I was doing the same thing.

Grandparents University (GPU) is a two-day event where grandparents and their grandchildren embrace Purdue and all it has to offer.

Participants choose a specific major to study and attend a class taught by Boilermaker experts. The majors aren’t exactly like the ones we have here at Purdue, but they do get to do cool activities like creating hot sauce, designing monsters, flying drones, and cooking in a Purdue kitchen. It’s a great opportunity to see wisdom and curiosity combined in the classroom, as grandparents and their grandchildren collaborate on these projects. They’re equally willing to learn from the instructors —and from each other—while creating lasting memories.

They might not know it yet, but this Purdue experience at such a young age will help with their college decision in a few years.

My mother started working at Purdue when she was pregnant with me, so I’ve been familiar with the university my whole life. Many of my childhood memories are associated with different parts of campus, and these memories played a big part in my decision to attend Purdue. I was going to a place that I knew—a place I already considered a home away from home. In the same way, when these children make their college decisions, they will already have built connections with Purdue through Grandparents University.

It will also help they already have a Purdue degree!

At the end of GPU, the kids graduate just like regular students by walking across the stage of Elliott Hall of Music. They even have their own caps to decorate and keep—which is great because robe rentals would be a nightmare.

I had been to nine commencement ceremonies before my own in May, so I’m well-versed in Purdue graduations. Nevertheless, it was still fun to watch this one.

These children had learned so much more than what was taught in their major. They learned more about their grandparents and strengthened their connection with them. They learned about the university and what’s in store for them when they (hopefully) become Boilermakers. And at the Block Party, they befriended students they had never met before and hung out on Memorial Mall—just like regular college students.

It was almost exactly what I experienced throughout my college career. Yes, I got my degree and now  have a job as was intended on this life path. But I also made lifelong friendships and went outside my comfort zone in ways that helped me grow as an individual.

Purdue shaped me and continues to shape me. I credit a lot of my growth as a person and a professional to my college career here, and a lot of what I know to the professors and instructors I had throughout my education.

Through Grandparents University, you have the opportunity to provide the same transformative experience for future Boilermakers. You can be the Purdue instructor that inspires a path that lasts a lifetime.

Patsy J. Mellott

BS College of Health and Human Sciences, 1969
Fishers, IN

Patsy earned a bachelor’s degree in food and nutrition in business from Purdue in 1969, in addition to an MBA in food marketing from Michigan State University in 1970. She retired from Kraft Foods in 2006 after 36 years in corporate food marketing and marketing communications management.

A community volunteer, Patsy serves on the Women’s Fund of Central Indiana Advisory Board and the Purdue College of Health and Human Sciences Dean’s Leadership Council, in addition to the President’s Council Advisory Board. She is a former member of the Health and Human Sciences Alumni Board. Patsy held several offices from 2006 through 2013, including president and treasurer. She serves her community’s Discover Indianapolis Club in Fishers, holding several leadership roles for over 10 years.

Patsy has received several honors, including the Purdue University Nutrition Science Department Hall of Fame recipient in 2009 and the Purdue University College of Health and Human Sciences Distinguished Alumni Award in 2016. She also received the college’s Gold and Black Award in 2016, an honor reserved for donors who have moved the college forward by committing exceptional financial resources.

In addition to endowing two scholarships, the Patsy J. Mellott Scholarship and Patsy J. Mellott HHS Scholarship, she established the Patsy J. Mellott Teaching Innovation Award in the College of Health and Human Sciences in 2013. In 2015, she endowed the Patsy J. Mellott Women’s Tennis Coach Performance Award. She is a lead donor in the Christine M. Ladisch Faculty Leadership Award and the Purdue Women’s Network Virginia C. Meredith Scholarship for the College of Health and Human Sciences.