CAMPUS NOTICE

 

OFFICE OF THE CHANCELLOR

September 4, 2019


ALL ACADEMICS AND STAFF AT UC SAN DIEGO

Subject:    Reappointment of Carol Padden as Dean of the Division of Social Sciences

We are delighted to inform the campus community of the continued
appointment of Carol Padden as Dean of the Division of Social Sciences.
Dean Padden is a MacArthur “Genius” Award-winning scholar of sign
languages and holds the Sanford I. Berman Chair in Language and Human
Communication.

The Division of Social Sciences is one of the largest divisions at UC
San Diego, spanning 11 academic departments and numerous
interdisciplinary programs and research centers that focus on some of
the most pressing and important social issues of our time. Through her
active leadership, a new department of Urban Studies and Planning was
formally established in spring 2019, featuring a newly launched second
major in Real Estate and Development. Several departments have likewise
expanded their core curriculum to include new majors; these include a
new B.S. in Political Science and Data Analytics, a Linguistics B.S. in
Speech and Language Sciences, a B.S offered by the Economics department
in Math-Economics, a B.A. in Business Psychology and a B.S. for students
in Human Developmental Sciences to assist in their preparation for
professional training, including medical school. The Division of Social
Sciences recently added a new master’s program in Global Health in
addition to its existing B.A. and B.S. majors in that field. The success
of these programs is indicated, for example, by the nearly 300 majors in
the Global Health Program since its launch in 2015.

During her first term, Dean Padden emphasized a strongly
interdisciplinary approach to both education and research, in alignment
with the campus’s strategic plan, encouraging faculty to form
cross-disciplinary collaborations within and beyond the Division,
including those with the Division of Arts and Humanities in support of
the Institute for Practical Ethics. She also supported the larger campus
community through cross-divisional faculty appointments with Scripps
Institution of Oceanography, School of Global Policy and Strategy and
via development of an Asset Management Center linking the Department of
Economics with the Rady School of Management.

Dean Padden embraces the fundamental intellectual commitments of our
public university to the people of California – and has been highly
successful at securing external resources to sustain this work. Her
stewardship led to Social Sciences' exceeding their $50 million Capital
Campaign goal. She is responsible for securing the largest single gift
to the Social Sciences of over $5 million dollars to endow the
Yankelovich Center for Social Science Research. The Center distributes
seed funding each year for impactful faculty research into social
inequality and social immobility. Another generous philanthropic gift is
enabling the advent of “precision education,” a pilot project between
neurosciences and education studies aimed at using fundamental
scientific discoveries about the brain to plan effective teaching
programs for children in preschool and grades K-3. In addition, a
project launched with seed funding from the Yankelovich Center has now
garnered a substantial gift from the Gates Foundation, enabling CREATE
to provide expanded training for middle school math teachers around the
region in new methodology for algebra instruction. We anticipate this
will help prepare a larger and more diverse cohort of students to enter
the pipeline for admission to UC and CSU campuses.

We are pleased to acknowledge the many advances the Division has made
during Carol Padden’s first term, and we anticipate further innovative
developments in the years to come. We extend our sincere appreciation
to the review committee for its thorough work and insightful commentary.
Please join us in congratulating Dean Carol Padden on her renewed
appointment and in thanking her for her outstanding service to UC San
Diego. We look forward to her continued leadership of the Division of
Social Sciences.



Pradeep K. Khosla
Chancellor

Elizabeth H. Simmons
Executive Vice Chancellor