Dr. Edgar Odell Lovett, Rice Institute President, 1907-1946

Edgar Odell Lovett (1871-1957), mathematics professor and president of Rice Institute (now Rice University), was born in Shreve, Ohio, on April 14, 1871. After graduating from Shreve High School he entered Bethany College, Bethany, WV, where he graduated in 1890. From 1890 until 1892 he was professor of mathematics at West Kentucky College; in 1892 he became an instructor at the University of Virginia, where he continued his studies and received degrees of M.A. and Ph.D. in 1895. The following year he studied in Europe and received M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Leipzig in 1896. In 1897 Lovett lectured at Johns Hopkins University and the universities of Virginia and Chicago, and became instructor in mathematics at Princeton University in September. He was promoted to assistant professor of mathematics in 1898 and from 1900 to 1905 held the rank of professor. From 1905 to 1908 he was both professor and head of the Department of Mathematics and Astronomy at Princeton.

In 1907 he was asked to head Rice Institute, Houston, being recommended for the post by Woodrow Wilson, then president of Princeton. He accepted in 1908, moved to Houston, and was formally inaugurated as the first president of the institute on Oct. 12, 1912; he continued in this capacity until his retirement on March 1, 1946. Thereafter, he was associated with Rice as president emeritus, director and consultant.

Lovett was a member of many learned societies, including Phi Beta Kappa, the London Mathematical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Royal Astronomical Society. In 1898 he married Mary Ellen Hale; they had two daughters and two sons. He died on Aug. 13, 1957, and was buried in Glenwood Cemetery, Houston.

Excerpted from "The New Handbook of Texas,” 1996.

No provost served under President Lovett, as he played both roles.

Online guide to the Lovett presidential records at the Woodson Research Center.

Dr. William Vermillion Houston, Rice Institute President, 1946-1960

William Vermillion Houston (pronounced How-ston) was born in Mount Giliad, Ohio, on January 19, 1900. He received B.A. and B.S. degrees from Ohio State University in 1920. In 1922, he received an M.S. degree from the University of Chicago, and in 1925, his Ph.D. from Ohio State University.

Houston was a National Research Fellow at the California Institute of Technology, and taught there until he became president of what was then Rice Institute, later Rice University, in 1946. Houston studied in Germany on a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1927, assisting Warner Heisenberg and others in the development of quantum theory.

The U.S. Navy awarded Houston its Medal of Merit for directing development of the first homing torpedo and for supervising scientific studies which helped improve U.S. weapon effectiveness in the area of undersea warfare. Because of his genuine modesty, Houston never wore his Medal of Merit ribbon.

Houston made pioneering efforts in the fields of atomic spectroscopy and solid state theory. He was the author of two books: Principles of Mathematical Physics (1934) and Principles of Quantum Mechanics (1951), as well as of numerous scientific articles. After having been a fellow of the American Physical Society for many years, he was elected its president in 1962. He also served on the Society council.

Houston was a member of the National Academy of Sciences, serving on its council and on several important committees. He was also a member of the American Philosophical Society and several other scientific and educational associations. He served on the National Science Board and as a trustee of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. He retired from Rice in 1960, due to ill health.

Remembered for at Rice: When Houston arrived at Rice in 1946, he greatly expanded graduate study and research. He also initiated a five-year engineering program with greater emphasis on the humanities than had previously existed, and implemented the planned residential college system.

Houston died after a brief illness, in Edinburgh, Scotland on August 22, 1968, while attending the 111th International Conference on Low-tempurature Physics at St. Andrew's University.

Provost serving under President Houston: Carey Croneis, who served 1954-1970. Croneis also served as Acting President until President Kenneth Pitzer began his tenure at Rice in 1961. Croneis then continued his work under the title of Chancellor.

Online guide to the Houston presidential records at the Woodson Research Center.

Dr. Kenneth Sanborn Pitzer, Rice University President, 1961-1968

Kenneth Sanborn Pitzer was named Rice's third president in 1961, after serving as dean of the College of Chemistry at the University of California-Berkeley. He became known for his vision which not only maintained Rice's rigorous undergraduate education but also made it a research university of national standing.

Remembered for at Rice: Some of Pitzer's accomplishments include bringing in federal funding for research projects, creating the nation's first space science program, doubling the size of the Fondren Library, opening the university to students of all races, starting the Continuing Studies Program, creating a bio-chemistry department, expanding the social sciences school and more than doubling the number of graduate students and faculty.

Pitzer left Rice in 1968 to become president of Stanford University. He later returned to teaching and research in chemistry at Berkeley, where he retired. He won numerous awards for his contributions to the field of theoretical and physical chemistry, including the Welch Prize in Chemistry, the American Chemical Society's Award in Pure Chemistry and a membership in the National Academy of Sciences. He died in 1998 at age 83. A fellowship in his name, the Kenneth S. Pitzer / Schlumberger Endowed Chair was established in 2003, with Rice chemist Dr. Robert Curl being the first to hold the chair.

Excerpted from Rice News article, Jan. 16, 2003.

Carey Croneis (1954-70) served as Chancellor, not Provost, under President Pitzer (1961-68).

Online guide to Pitzer's presidential records at the Woodson Research Center.

Dr. William H. Masterson, Rice University President, 1969

A five-day controversy rose on the campus of Rice University in February 1969 following the appointment of Dr. William H. Masterson by the Board of Trustees as the university’s new President to succeed Kenneth Pitzer, who had resigned in August 1968. The controversy ended with the resignation of Dr. Masterson after only five days in office.

Members of the faculty and student body protested in particular the method by which Masterson had been appointed, which was perceived as a unilateral decision by the Board without sufficient consultation with the committee of faculty and students appointed earlier by the Board to assist in suggesting and screening candidates’ names. A variety of personal objections to Masterson himself were also voiced, along with concern about appointment of a President from within the university (Masterson was a graduate of Rice who had joined the faculty in the Department of History in 1951 and served later as Dean of Humanities before leaving Rice in 1966 to serve as President of the University of Chattanooga).

As a result of the pressure created by the protests and by a campus-wide poll conducted among students and faculty (results of which were made known to Masterson), the controversy ended with Masterson’s resignation as President on February 25th, five days after his appointment had been announced.

The Masterson controversy can be seen within the context of a decade of nation-wide turmoil resulting from (among other things) the Civil Rights movement, the war in Vietnam, the emergence of feminism and women’s rights, and a general rebellion against authority among many of the nation’s youth. (Notable among other campus disturbances of the period was the confrontation between students and National Guardsmen at Kent State University in Ohio in May 1970, in which four students were killed and nine injured).

Within two weeks of the Masterson controversy, a committee was formed to sponsor an undertaking called the Oral History Project on the Presidential Crisis of February, 1969 at Rice University. The project sponsors were Joseph Cooper, Associate Professor of Political Science and Chairman of the Department; Harold M. Hyman, Professor of History and Chairman of the Department; and Richard H. Lytle, University Archivist and Curator of Manuscripts and Rare Books, who was appointed as Administrator of the Oral History Project. An outside consultant and an interviewer were also appointed. The purpose of the project was “to collect data for scholars doing research in social and economic change in the university,” and funding was provided by a grant awarded by Rice University’s Center for Research in Social Change and Economic Development.

Interviews were conducted between May and October 1969 and were recorded on reel-to-reel magnetic tapes, from which transcriptions or abstracts were then made.

Carey Croneis (1954-70) was serving as Chancellor (essentially, provost) during the brief presidency of Dr. Masterson.

Frank Vandiver was named Acting President after Masterson resigned, serving 1969-1970, until President Norman Hackerman was in place.

In 1970, Vandiver was then named Provost, and went on to simultaneously serve as Vice-President starting in 1975.

Online guide to the Masterson Controversy records, including oral history interviews (tapes, cd's, transcripts), news releases, photographs, color slides, publications, campus directories, student papers, available at Woodson Research Center.

Dr. Norman Hackerman, Rice University President, 1970-1985

Norman Hackerman served as Rice Univerity's fourth President from 1970 - 1985, after serving 25 years at the University of Texas. Immediately preceeding Hackerman was Acting President Frank Vandiver (1969-1970), who succeeded Kenneth Sanborn Pitzer.

Known for at Rice: During his tenure at Rice, the university launched the Jeese H. Jones Graduate School of Administration and the Shepherd School of Music, as well as establishing separate engineering and social sciences schools, and new biochemistry, linguistics, and computer science departments. The endowment was significantly increased by his fundraising efforts, and the residential college system went co-ed under his approval.

Controversy touched his presidency in the early 1980s, when Rice hired Watson Brown as head football coach at a high salary, bringing many complaints from academic-oriented students and faculty. Hackerman reportedly considered the criticism a "commentary on society, not on [himself]".

Hackerman, a chemist, was born in Baltimore, MD in 1912, and graduated with bachelor's (1932) and doctoral (1935) degrees from Johns Hopkins University. He joined the University of Texas faculty as an assistant professor in 1945, and worked his way up through the academic ladder to become President in 1967. The Rice Board of Trustees established the Norman Hackerman Fellowship in Chemistry in honor of Hackerman’s 90th birthday in 2002. Dr. Hackerman died in 2007 at age 95.

Provost Frank Vandiver served under President Norman Hackerman starting from the begining of Hackerman's tenure in 1970, and in 1975 Hackerman gave Vandiver the additional role Vice-President. Vandiver resigned in 1980 to become President of the University of North Texas and then served as president of Texas A&M from 1981 - 1988.

Joseph Cooper served as Acting Provost in 1973-1974 while Vandiver served as Visiting Professor of Military History at West Point.

William E. Gordon became Provost / Vice President under Hackerman in 1980.

Online guide to Hackerman's presidential records at the Woodson Research Center.

Dr. George Erik Rupp, Rice University President, 1985-1993

On Friday, October 25, 1985, George Erik Rupp was officially inaugurated as the fifth president of Rice University, after having taken office as President on July 1, 1985. Dr. Rupp began his education in the public schools of New Jersey, worked a paper route with his brothers, and worked through high school as a grocery store checker and stocker. He then became a carpenter, built houses, saved money, and went on to study English and German literature at the University of Munich in Germany and at Princeton University, where was a Phi Beta Kappa member and was awarded a B.A. with high honors in 1964. He then pursued graduate study in theology at Yale Divinty School (Bachelor of Divinity magna cum laude, 1976) and then at Harvard University (Ph. D. 1971). During his schooling, Rupp received a number awards and scholarships, including a Danforth Graduate Fellowship, a Dwight Fellowship, the Tew Prize, the Mersick Prize, and the Daggett Prize.

After receiving his doctorate, Rupp served as Faculty Fellow at Johnston College, part of the University of Redlands, in Redlands, CA. He was appointed Vice Chancellor in 1973 and assumed responsibilities as the school's chief academic officer. Soon thereafter, in 1974, he returned to Harvard's Divinity School, teaching theology and taking a leave of absence in 1976 to conduct research at the University of Tubingen in Germany.

In 1977, Rupp was appointed Prof. of Humanistic Studies and Dean for Academic Affairs at the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, and was responsible for all of the school's instructional, research, and outreach programs. Rupp then served as Dean of Harvard University's Divinity School from 1979-1985.

Known for at Rice: In signing on as Rice University's president in 1985, at the age of 43, he became the second youngest Rice president (Lovett was 36 at the time of his appointment in 1908) and as a theologian, he was the first non-scientist president. He served Rice for eight years. During that time, two major buildings opened, one for music and one for biosciences and bioengineering (1991). Six interdisciplinary research centers were established, including the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy. He also led a revision of the core curriculum to require students to explore fields outside their majors. Research grants doubled, the quality of graduate students improved, and the number of undergraduate applicants tripled.

During his tenure at Rice, Rupp was quoted as saying "Ideas may be important, certainly individuals are important, but institutions shape both individuals and ideas in a very profound way. It's a mistake to underestimate the extent to which institutional patterns make a real difference in people's lives."

Additionally, he said "I have a sense that the thousands of bit decisions that someone like the president of a university makes every day do have a cummulative effect, and it's worth making them seriously and carefully because over the long haul, it makes a difference whether they are made responsibly or indifferently or casually."

Rupp was known for his strong administrative style and for significantly raising the national profile of the university. A disagreement with the trustees over fundraising tactics (trustees' reticence to aggressively develop new resources, depending instead on generosity of past donors) led him to announce in Fall 1992 that he would step down, which he did in June, 1993. Rupp went on to become president of Columbia University in Fall 1993.

Dr. Neal Lane served as Provost under President Rupp.

Online guide to the Rupp presidential records at the Woodson Research Center.

Dr. Malcolm Gillis, Rice University President, 1993-2004

Malcolm Gillis was born in 1940 and spent his youth in rural Florida.  While in junior high school in 1952 he entered the labor force and was employed for the next seven years by farm supply and building materials stores.  He worked his way through high school and then college at the University of Florida, where he met Elizabeth, his spouse of fifty years.  He received both a B.A. and M.A. from Florida.  He received his PhD in Economics from the University of Illinois in 1968.

His first academic appointment was at Duke University in 1968.  In 1970 he moved to Harvard, where he alternated teaching and research with economic advisory work in Indonesia, Colombia, Ecuador, Ghana, Canada and Alaska.  He returned to Duke in 1984 as Professor of Public Policy and Economics, later occupying the Z. Smith Reynolds Chair in Public Policy.  In 1986 he was named Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School at Duke and in 1990 he became Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.  

He was named Rice President in 1993, serving until 2004.  Beginning with his inaugural address in 1993, he consistently stressed several principal goals for turn-of-century Rice.  These included internationalization in teaching and research, collaboration across academic institutions and disciplines, the need for substantial growth both in faculty size and academic facilities and enhancement both of undergraduate teaching and graduate research.

During this period, Rice launched the world’s first comprehensive program in nanoscale science and technology in 1994, while beginning a broadening at its focus well beyond the hedges, with nearly 70 new programs in local outreach over the next decade.

New initiatives undertaken during his tenure required significant infusions of new resources.  To this end, his administration developed the University’s first strategic plan, which provided a template for Rice’s first ever comprehensive fund-raising campaign, with a goal of half a billion dollars.  The campaign came to a successful conclusion in 2004, raising $503 million in new resources, allowing among other improvements, a 35% increase both in faculty size and academic space.

While president, Gillis continued to publish in his scholarly specialties of fiscal economics, economic development and environmental policy. A former co-editor of the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the oldest economics journal in the U.S., he published more than 75 articles in scholarly journals and books.  Individually and jointly, he wrote or edited eight books, including the widely cited 1988 co-authored publication Public Policy and the Misuse of Forest Resources.  He also co-authored the leading textbook in the field, Economics of Development, now available in five languages.  His facility in learning languages, especially Spanish and Indonesian, greatly strengthened his research and service in over 25 nations on all continents except Antarctica.  While president, he founded and led several new academic entities.  These included the Shell Center for Sustainable Development, the TEXAS/UK Research Collaborative for Nanotechnology and Biotechnology and the Boniuk Center for the Study of Religious Tolerance.

During and after his presidency, he served on numerous public service boards, including the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas (1998-2004), the Greater Houston Partnership, BioHouston and many others.  During this period, he also received the Rice Alumni Gold Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, the Center for the Healing of Racism leadership award, the Person of Vision Award, and the Distinguished Award from the Institute of International Education.  He was a founding member of the Board of International University Bremen in Germany, a very successful institution modeled after Rice.

Gillis resumed teaching in 2005, both in economics and in university-wide courses, under the title University Professor, the highest faculty designation in the university.

 In 2004, Board Chair, Bill Barnett, offered a succinct sketch of Rice during Gillis’ period as President:  “in addition to the strategic building program, Malcolm guided an unprecedented period of collaboration with other institutions; a deeper and more fruitful involvement in the community; an enormous enhancement of Rice’s international presence through such things as the Baker Institute for Pubic Policy, study abroad and International University Bremen; a successful effort to maintain diversity under difficult circumstances; a very substantial expansion of the faculty; a foresighted investment in nano, bio, info and enviro science and technology; the biggest expansion of humanities facilities ever; the first addition to the college system in 30 years; the rise of the Jesse Jones Graduate School of Management; and on and on.”

Professor Gillis died in October 2015. He is survived by his wife, Elizabeth, three children and several grandchildren, including a Rice graduate (2009).

Neal Lane served as Provost under President Gillis from July to November, 1993.

James Kinsey served as Interim Provost under President Gillis, in 1994.

David Auston served as Provost under President Gillis, from 1994-1999.

Eugene Levy served as Provost under President Gillis and President Leebron, from 2000-2010.

Online guide to the Gillis presidential papers at the Woodson Research Center.

David W. Leebron, Rice University President, 2004-2022

David W. Leebron became Rice University’s seventh president in 2004 and served for 18 years until 2022. Under Leebron’s guidance, the institution underwent a period of growth and transformation. Over the past eighteen years, the university has increased its undergraduate and graduate student populations, enhanced the campus with over $1.8 billion in new construction and capital improvements (some currently underway), extended its research endeavors and international presence, deepened its relationship with its home city of Houston, and earned greater visibility locally, nationally and internationally.

Early in his presidency, Leebron engaged in extensive consultations that produced the Vision for the Second Century (V2C), a plan for Rice’s growth and advancement as one of the world’s premier research universities. One of the biggest changes has occurred in undergraduate enrollment, which will be enlarged from about 2,900 in 2004 to 4,800 students by the fall of 2025. With an increase in graduate programs as well, the student body will have grown by over 80% over the last two decades, to more than 9,000. The Rice Investment financial aid program, launched in 2018 to national recognition, offers free and greatly reduced tuition to students from low- and middle-income families. Undergraduate students from underrepresented groups grew by almost 75% and international students increased sixfold during Leebron's tenure. The number of applicants has increased fourfold, and undergraduate and graduate students now come from every state and 89 countries.

International experience was an important part of Leebron’s mission to provide students with a holistic education. Much like Rice’s first president, Edgar Odell Lovett, Leebron brought a powerful international vision to the post and has actively reached out to Asia and Latin America. Study abroad programs in Argentina and India were added, along with study and research opportunities in Latin America, China, India and Turkey. Under his leadership, Rice also opened its first international campus in Paris, France. Leebron welcomed hundreds of global political and academic leaders, including the Dalai Lama, former President Bill Clinton, former Indian President Abdul Kalam, and Houston Mayor and Rice alumna Annise Parker.

Despite the challenges of the global pandemic, the university significantly increased external research funding and began a number of major new initiatives. These include major investments in materials science and the Carbon Hub, which was created in partnership with Shell and will direct basic science and engineering on multiple technologies with the focus on reducing carbon emissions. In the last eighteen years many other new institutes and research centers were launched, including Rice 360 for Global Health, the Chao Center for Asian Studies, the Center for African and African American Studies, the Center for the Study of Women, Gender, and Sexuality, the Baker Institute Center for the United States and Mexico, and the Liu Idea Lab for Information & Entrepreneurship.

At the same time, Leebron strengthened the university’s local presence with multiple programs and centers that connect students and faculty with Houston residents and the Greater Houston community. In 2010, the Kinder Institute for Urban Research was launched at Rice. Home to the Kinder Houston Area Survey, the longest-running in-depth survey of any urban area in the U.S., the institute will build on that to study the phenomenon of urbanization in cities around the world to improve understanding of the modern global city. In partnership with the City of Houston, Rice began developing a new Midtown innovation district designed to bring together the area’s entrepreneurial, corporate and academic communities. The Ion, a mixed use space in the former Sears building, will serve as an innovation and incubation facility. Student opportunity and engagement in the city were fostered by the creation of the Passport to Houston and what is now the Center for Civic Leadership.

Under Leebron’s leadership, the campus added many new buildings and began construction of others. Academic enhancements include the 10-story BioScience Research Collaborative neighboring the Texas Medical Center; Brockman Hall for Physics; the O'Connor Building for Engineering; Kraft Hall for Social Sciences; Cannady Hall for Architecture; and Anderson-Clarke Hall for Continuing Studies. Leebron also
focused on the arts, and new facilities included the Moody Center for the Arts; Brockman Hall for opera; and fundraising and planning for the Sarofim Hall for visual arts. Athletics and student wellbeing were enhanced by Tudor Field House, the Gibbs Wellness and Recreation Center, Patterson Sports Performance Center and the George R. Brown Tennis Center. Other student facilities and campus community enhancements included two new residential colleges (Duncan and McMurtry), a completely new Sid Rich College and new wings of other existing colleges as well as ; the centrally located
Brochstein Pavillion, a planned new student center and an explosion of campus art, including James Turrell’s Twilight Epiphany Skyspace.

Prior to taking the helm at Rice, Leebron was dean of Columbia Law School. A native of Philadelphia, he is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, where he was elected president of the Law Review in his second year. After graduating in 1979, he served as a law clerk for Judge Shirley Hufstedler on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in Los Angeles. He began teaching at the UCLA School of Law in 1980 and at the NYU School of Law in 1983. In 1989, Leebron joined the faculty of Columbia Law School, and in 1996 he was appointed dean and the Lucy G. Moses Professor of Law. Leebron also served as a visiting fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law in Hamburg, Germany, and as the Jean Monnet Visiting Professor of Law at Bielefeld University. 

In 2006, Leebron was presented with France’s Commandeur de l’Ordre national du Mérite, and in 2008, he received an honorary doctorate from Nankai University and was awarded the Encomienda de la Orden de Isabel la Catolica by the government of Spain. In 2010, Leebron and his wife, University Representative Y. Ping Sun, were selected by the Greater Houston Partnership as the city’s International Executives of the Year for helping make Houston a center of international business, and in 2022, Leebron
received Houston Business Journal’s Lifetime Achievement Award for Diversity in Business.

Leebron, now University Professor and President Emeritus, will spend a sabbatical year as the Beinecke Visiting Professor and Distinguished Leader in Residence at Columbia Law School. He will also serve as the William Nelson Cromwell Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard University. After the one-year sabbatical term he will return to Rice as a member of the political science department. Sun will join him on sabbatical, and will also remain active with a number of nonprofit organizations in Houston and serve as counsel to the law firm of Yetter & Coleman LLP.

Leebron and Sun have two children, Daniel and Merissa.

Eugene Levy served as Provost with President Leebron from 2004-2010.

George McClendon served as Provost with President Leebron from 2010-2015.

Marie Lynn Miranda served as Provost with President Leebron from 2015-2019.

Seiichi Matsuda served as Interim Provost with President Leebron from 2019-2020.

Reginald DesRoches served as Provost with President Leebron from 2020-2022, when he took office as the President of Rice University.

Online guide to the Leebron presidential papers at the Woodson Research Center.

Dr. Reginald DesRoches, Rice University President, 2022-present

Dr. Reginald DesRoches became Rice University’s eighth president on July 1, 2022. He also serves as a professor of civil and environmental engineering, and professor of mechanical engineering. He previously served as Rice's Howard Hughes Provost and William and Stephanie Sick Dean of Engineering. DesRoches’ top priorities are to enable Rice to reach a new level of distinction nationally and internationally for impactful research, award-winning scholarship and insightful creative work. He also wants to build graduate programs that are of the same distinction as Rice’s top rated undergraduate programs while maintaining Rice’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion.

During his tenure as provost, DesRoches led the university’s academic, research, scholarly and creative activities through the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, including the sudden suspension of classroom instruction and Rice’s successful conversion to remote learning. In addition, he dramatically increased the university’s research awards, launched several new centers and institutes, and forged new partnerships and programs with institutions and organizations in the Houston area, including the Texas Medical Center.

Under his leadership, several new majors and professional master’s programs were launched, including a new undergraduate business major. Several new online programs were created during his time as provost as well, including the online degrees in the Jones Graduate School of Business and several online master’s degrees in the School of Engineering. During his time as provost, DesRoches made diversity, equity and inclusion a priority, establishing the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, which has been instrumental in dramatically increasing the diversity of Rice’s faculty and graduate student population. He also began leading the first major expansion of the undergraduate body in over a decade.

DesRoches' tenure at Rice began in 2017, when he accepted the post as the William and Stephanie Sick Dean of Engineering at the George R. Brown School of Engineering. As the leader of Rice’s engineering school, he was in charge of nine departments, 137 faculty and 2,500 students. During his time as dean, the school dramatically increased in size, stature and department rankings. It also saw a significant growth in research programs. Several key interdisciplinary initiatives were launched during DesRoches’ time as dean, some of which were neuroengineering, synthetic biology and data science. He also led the establishment of the a collaborative research center in India with IIT-Kanpur, the first of its kind.

Before his appointment at Rice, DesRoches served as chair of the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Georgia Tech in Atlanta. As chair, he led a major renovation of the school’s main research and teaching home, and he spearheaded a major fundraising effort for the school that doubled the number of endowed chairs and professors. During his tenure as chair, the school dramatically moved up in the U.S News & World Report graduate rankings, achieving a ranking of No. 2 in the nation — the highest in the history of the school.

In 2014, DesRoches became Georgia Tech’s Faculty Athletics Representative, serving as the liaison between the university and its athletics department. He worked closely with the athletic director and university leadership — including the president, provost and senior vice provost for academic affairs — to formulate policies affecting intercollegiate athletics on campus. His responsibilities also included representing the institute to the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) and the National Collegiate Athletic Association. During the 2016-2017 school year, he was appointed to the ACC leadership team as vice president of the conference.

DesRoches’ primary research interests are in the design of resilient infrastructure systems under extreme loads and the application of smart materials. His research is highly interdisciplinary and spans micro- to macro-scales. He has published approximately 300 articles and delivered more than 100 presentations in over 30 different countries. He also has mentored more than 30 doctoral students, many of whom hold faculty positions at top universities around the world.

A fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and the society's Structural Engineering Institute (SEI), DesRoches served as the key technical leader in the United States’ response to the 2010 Haiti earthquake, taking a team of 28 engineers, architects, city planners and social scientists to study the impact of the earthquake. He also has participated in numerous congressional briefings to underscore the critical role that university research must play in addressing the country’s failing infrastructure and enhancing the nation’s resilience to natural hazards.

DesRoches chaired the National Institute of Standards and Technology's (NIST) National Construction Safety Team Advisory Committee (NCST), which is overseeing NIST’s investigation of the collapse of the Champlain Towers South Condominium in Surfside, Florida. He is on the advisory board for the Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) Simulation Center, the California Department of Transportation Seismic Advisory Board, the Halliburton Labs Clean Tech Accelerator and the HTX Impact Fund, which is focused on minority led startups.

He previously served on the advisory committee for the Engineering Directorate for the National Science Foundation, the National Academies Resilient America Roundtable (RAR), the Global Earthquake Modeling Scientific Board and the National Science Foundation Engineering Advisory Council. In recent years, DesRoches has testified before U.S. House and Senate subcommittees on the science of earthquake resilience, and he has participated in Washington, D.C., roundtables for media and congressional staffers on topics ranging from disaster preparedness to challenges for African American men in STEM fields.

A member of the National Academy of Engineering, DesRoches’ distinctive research record has been recognized for its impact and innovation. He received the Distinguished Arnold Kerr Lecturer Award in 2019, the John A. Blume Distinguished Lecturer Award in 2018, and the 2018 Earthquake Engineering Research Institute Distinguished Lecturer Award, one of the highest honors in the field of earthquake engineering. He also is a recipient of the 2015 ASCE Charles Martin Duke Lifeline Earthquake Engineering award, the 2007 ASCE Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize, and the Georgia Tech ANAK Award, which is the highest honor the Georgia Tech student body can bestow on a faculty member. He received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) in 2002, the John A. Blume Distinguished Lecture in 2018 and the Georgia Tech Outstanding Doctoral Thesis Adviser Award in 2010. DesRoches is a member of the Academy of Distinguished Alumni in Civil Engineering at Berkeley and was recently named an honorary alumnus of Georgia Tech.

DesRoches was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and grew up in Queens, New York. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, a Master of Science in Civil Engineering and a Doctorate in Structural Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley.

DesRoches is married to Paula DesRoches, a highly accomplished healthcare professional, nurse practitioner and administrator recognized for her leadership in occupational health. The couple has three children, Andrew, Jacob and Shelby, who is a student at Rice.