Twenty-nine new faculty positions have been approved in the first year of funding for a presidential initiative to hire faculty in targeted areas.
President Steven Leath launched the Presidential High-Impact Hires Initiative last month to support faculty hiring in areas of strategic importance to the university and Iowa.
The initiative will be funded with $1.5 million in new state appropriations and $500,000 gained from efficiencies within the academic affairs division. Hiring units will provide matching funds.
The new faculty posts include 20 interdisciplinary positions in the areas of big data and translational health, and positions that expand capabilities in areas like communication, policy analysis and real estate economics, or address Iowa State's record enrollment.
"I am excited to see how faculty are planning to work across colleges, and across departments, to expand our capabilities in areas important to Iowa's future," Leath said. "If we combine this initiative with the 85 faculty we already were planning to recruit this year, that means we're looking for more than 100 outstanding faculty to join Iowa State."
The recruiting efforts, if successful, will surpass Leath's stated goal of hiring 200 new faculty in three years.
Senior vice president and provost Jonathan Wickert praised the colleges and units for the quality and collaboration of the hiring proposals.
"The $2 million central investment will be matched dollar-for-dollar by the academic colleges and extension and outreach," Wickert said. "The growth in the tenure-track and tenured faculty ranks resulting from this initiative will make a real difference."
The 29 high-impact hires are listed below. Visit the provost's website for a full listing of this year's open faculty positions.
Strategic importance/high enrollment
*Collaborative hiring with ISU Extension and Outreach
|
College |
Teaching and research areas |
|
Agriculture and Life Sciences |
*Agronomy – integrated cropping systems and precision agriculture |
|
Design |
*Community and Regional Planning – real estate economics (in collaboration with the College of Business) |
|
|
Interdepartmental – scientific visualization and biomedical illustration (in collaboration with the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences' Biological and Premedical Illustration program) |
|
|
Interdepartmental – geographic information systems, GeoDesign, geospatial technology |
|
|
Interdepartmental – historic preservation |
|
Human Sciences |
*School of Education – post-secondary education, underrepresented populations, and community engagement |
|
Liberal Arts and Sciences |
English – ISUComm, written, oral, visual and electronic communication |
|
|
English – science communication |
|
|
Political Science – bioeconomy and energy policy (in collaboration with the Bioeconomy Institute) |
Translational health
|
College |
Teaching and research areas |
|
Engineering |
Interdepartmental (two positions) – biological materials, diagnostic, therapeutic and medical devices |
|
Human Sciences |
Food Science and Human Nutrition – neurobiology, human health promotion, chronic disease prevention, underserved populations |
|
|
Human Development and Family Studies – family health, health and wellness, and personal health |
|
|
Kinesiology – obesity, exercise, physical activity, genetics and the environment |
|
Liberal Arts and Sciences |
Ecology, Evolution and Organismal Biology – systems biology, microbiomes |
|
Veterinary Medicine |
Interdepartmental (two positions) – infectious disease, pathogen-host interaction |
Big data
|
College |
Teaching and research areas |
|
Agriculture and Life Sciences |
Genetics, Development and Cell Biology – bioinformatics, maize genetics |
|
|
Plant Pathology and Microbiology – systems biology, biology teaching |
|
Business |
Interdepartmental (two positions) –business analytics |
|
Engineering |
Interdepartmental (four positions) – high performance algorithms, complex systems, materials informatics, data visualization |
|
Liberal Arts and Sciences |
Computer Science – data mining in software repositories |
|
|
Interdepartmental – privacy and security in the age of big data |
|
|
Statistics – data mining from a statistics perspective |
|
Veterinary Medicine |
Interdepartmental – DNA sequencing, pathogen detection |
