Carol Strohecker will be named the next Dean of the University of Minnesota’s College of Design, effective August 31, 2017, and pending approval by the Board of Regents in May, the school announced today.

“Carol brings to the University a wealth of experience as an innovative and collaborative leader who has advanced interdisciplinary research, education, and creative work in a variety of settings,” said Executive Vice President and Provost Karen Hanson.

“I am confident her breadth of leadership experience, her entrepreneurial energy, and her strengths in interdisciplinary research and creative activity will advance the excellence of the College of Design.”

As Dean, Strohecker will provide intellectual and strategic leadership and administrative oversight to the College of Design, one of the country’s most comprehensive design colleges. Additionally, she will work with faculty, staff, students, and a highly engaged alumni and professional community to enhance synergy among the college’s diverse design disciplines, and collaborate with other campus deans to advance the University’s collective mission

“The work that everyone at the College has done together has created a truly unique and attractive place – a place where a variety of disciplines, students, faculty, and staff can thrive,” said Strohecker. “I cannot wait to get started.”

Previously, Strohecker was vice provost for academic affairs at the Rhode Island School of Design, in Providence, R.I., from 2013-2016. She also served as inaugural director of the Center for Design Innovation from 2006-2013, where she held concurrent roles as chief research officer at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and as a tenured professor in art and visual studies at UNC’s Winston-Salem State University.

Strohecker holds a Ph.D. in media arts and sciences and a master of science in visual studies, both from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She has published and presented widely on topics related to learning theory and the development of environments in which people can learn through creative processes. Her portfolio includes creative works in various media, as well as collaborative work in interactive media tools and methods that has resulted in four U.S. patents.

Located in one of the major design cities and in one of the largest research universities in the U.S., the College of Design encompasses the full range of design disciplines at the University of Minnesota. The faculty, students, and staff in the college seek to advance the quality and value of the natural, designed, and social environments with an emphasis on sustainable, socially responsible, civically engaged, user-sensitive, critical and collaborative design work.

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