SUBJECT:

Interim Vice Chancellor - Student Affairs Alan Houston

I am pleased to announce that Alan Houston, provost of Eleanor Roosevelt College (ERC) and professor of political science, has been appointed as Interim Vice Chancellor - Student Affairs, effective July 1, 2013. He will serve as interim following the departure of Vice Chancellor Penny Rue, who is leaving UC San Diego on June 30, 2013 for a similar post at Wake Forest University.

Alan Houston has been the provost of ERC since January 2010, and is currently chair of the Council of Provosts. He has worked with staff and faculty to provide ERC's 3,700 undergraduates the academic and personal support needed to thrive. Houston has maintained the intellectual and pedagogical integrity of the college's programs in the face of budget cuts and has been instrumental in developing new learning opportunities for transfer students, service learning programs at home and abroad, and a minor in global health.

An internationally recognized scholar of early-modern British and American political thought, Houston joined the UC San Diego faculty in 1989. The author of four books, he uses archival research to establish new interpretations and advance scholarly methods in liberal, democratic and republican theory. Prior to becoming provost, he regularly taught freshman and senior seminars, in addition to core undergraduate and graduate courses in political theory. In 2012 he received the UC San Diego Chancellor's Associates Faculty Excellence Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. He was commended for his dedication to the personal and intellectual development of his students as individuals, and to the broader academic mission of UC San Diego.

I thank Alan Houston for agreeing to serve as the Interim Vice Chancellor - Student Affairs and ensuring a smooth transition for Student Affairs' leadership. A national search will be initiated in the fall for the next Vice Chancellor - Student Affairs.

Pradeep K. Khosla Chancellor