Dean - College of Science

About the Opportunity

THE SEARCH

Northeastern University - renowned for its innovative and entrepreneurial model of education and research - welcomes applications and nominations for the position of Dean of the College of Science. Northeastern's unique value proposition is grounded in several key tenets: an experiential education that prepares graduates to thrive in a technology-driven world; a global network of campuses and partners for students and faculty to leverage for learning and research; a deep investment in lifelong and experiential learning; a premium placed on pedagogical innovation; and a highly collaborative, partner-fueled research enterprise focused on high-impact solutions.

Northeastern has embarked on a new academic plan, Beyond 2025, that presents a unique vision of the future of education rooted in experience, emphasizing impact through education and research, and promoting deeply held values of service and respect. The Dean of the College of Science will lead the college's efforts to rethink the way education is delivered, with a greater focus on technology, personalization, and lifelong learning. They will build productive and creative partnerships across the whole of the university, including its global network, to leverage the strengths and experience of other academic units. As the college continues to grow, the dean will recruit and retain the best faculty and students, expanding the breadth of academic offerings and increasing the research productivity. The dean will engage outside partners-one of the hallmarks of the Northeastern model-to identify ways the college can coalesce academia and industry around greater societal challenges.

Finally, the dean will strengthen Northeastern's position as a truly global university, shaping its activities and fostering integrated education and research enterprise systems across all campuses around the world.

Northeastern has experienced unprecedented growth over the last 20 years. Annual external research funding has increased dramatically, fueled by its highly collaborative, interdisciplinary institutes and centers and the hiring of more than 1,000 tenured and tenure-track faculty. Northeastern's experiential model, with its signature co-op program, has expanded to include a vast array of real-world projects and experiences that attract top students at all stages of learning from around the world.

Over the past decade, Northeastern has also established 12 campuses outside Boston, across North America and in the U.K., that offer diverse opportunities in undergraduate and graduate learning, research, and entrepreneurship. This global network provides faculty and students a myriad of ways to learn and discover in new contexts, enriching education and maximizing the ability to make an impact. Northeastern is deeply committed to expanding global education, partnerships, and research, enabling learners to become leaders equipped to navigate and influence an interconnected world.

Northeastern has retained Isaacson, Miller, a national executive search firm, to assist in this search. All applications, inquiries, and nominations, which will remain confidential, should be directed to the search firm as indicated at the end of this document.

NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY

Trajectory

Founded in Boston in 1898, Northeastern is renowned for its experiential learning model, high-impact research, deep partnerships, and worldwide reach. From day one, the university has pursued innovative ways of teaching and research that place a premium on experience and engagement with the world. Today, its signature approach spans the world, empowering not only students, but faculty, alumni, partners, and innovators to explore ideas, solve problems, and scale impact.

Our global university provides our community and academic, government, and industry partners with unique opportunities to think locally and act globally. It includes 13 campuses across the U.S., U.K., and Canada, 320,000-plus alumni, and more than 3,800 employer partners worldwide, serving as a platform for scaling ideas, talent, and solutions.

The university's residential campuses for undergraduate and graduate education and research are located in Boston, London, and Oakland, California. Our research- and graduate-focused campuses are in the Massachusetts communities of Burlington and Nahant; Arlington, Virginia; Charlotte, North Carolina; Miami; Portland, Maine; Seattle; Silicon Valley, California; Toronto; and Vancouver.

Northeastern's personalized, experiential undergraduate and graduate programs lead to degrees through the doctorate in 10 colleges and schools across our campuses. Learning emphasizes the intersection of data, technology, and human literacies, uniquely preparing graduates for an AI-driven world and the careers of the future.

Our research enterprise, with an R1 Carnegie classification, is solutions-oriented and spans the world. Our faculty scholars and students work in teams that cross not just disciplines, but also sectors-aligned around solving today's highly interconnected global challenges and focused on transformative impact for humankind.

Measure of Success

The pace of change and progress at the university has accelerated significantly under the leadership of President Joseph E. Aoun. Northeastern's research profile and external funding levels have risen sharply: External research funding was $296.3 million in 2024, up more than 500% since 2006. In 2015, the university moved into the top tier for research activity when it achieved R1 status under the Carnegie Classification system. The university had an endowment of $1.9 billion as of June 30, 2024, and an FY24 operating budget of $2.3 billion.

Northeastern's faculty totals more than 4,000 (more than 2,000 are full-time) and comprises a diverse and talented group of teachers and scholars. The Academic Plan prioritizes research, personalized experiential learning, and global impact. The chairs, deans, and provost have built a tenure-track faculty aligned with Northeastern's strategic themes, supported by large investments in new campuses, facilities, and startup packages. Faculty productivity and distinction is at the heart of the Northeastern mission and of the university's commitment to growing its academic enterprise. The non-tenure-track faculty receive progressive titles for promotion, training on the science of teaching and learning, and directly participate in Northeastern's strong shared governance tradition. Faculty cite the interdisciplinary and translational intellectual culture of the university, Northeastern's excellence in foundational disciplinary research, and institutional momentum as key reasons for joining the university community.

Northeastern's distinctive, internationally recognized programs for experiential learning attract an increasingly academically talented pool of students. The university's signature cooperative education program (co-op) and other experiential programs have enabled Northeastern undergraduate and graduate students to have professional, research, and service opportunities in 151 countries, giving students real-world experience that adds enriching new dimensions to their classroom studies. Northeastern received 98,124 applications for the fall 2024 entering class, and the mean composite SAT score was 1483. Applications for master's and certificate programs exceeded 71,000 as of fall 2024, up 260% in the last decade. Over the past five years, 97% of Northeastern graduates were employed (full- or part-time) or in graduate school within nine months of graduation, and 91% of employed 2022 graduates were doing work related to their major. About 60% of graduates obtain their first job placement at one of their co-op employers.

About the Global Campuses

The university campuses operate as a distributed global network. For example, new programs may be developed and established at one of the network campuses, enhanced locally, and then offered throughout the broader campus system, consistent with local needs and demand. The successful Align computer science master's program-which accelerates people with no prior computer science education or training into a career in computing-is an example of this approach. It was designed, implemented, and revised in Seattle before being offered in Boston and other campuses. The university also encourages and enables students to benefit from pursuing learning and experiential opportunities at more than one campus in the system. Faculty are encouraged to use the campuses to scale their research, and several of the university's research institutes are located across multiple campuses. The Academic Plan envisions that all members of the Northeastern community will have a "passport" to the university's global network to maximize their own opportunities and the impact of their work.

THE COLLEGE OF SCIENCE

The College of Science integrates research, teaching, and experiential learning to provide students a dynamic and cross-disciplinary academic experience and understanding of science in society. The college offers a variety of distinguished programs in fields that are at the forefront of discovery, invention, and innovation. Academic offerings in the physical sciences, life sciences, and mathematics provide students with a deep understanding of emerging fields. The college is home to 3,865 undergraduate students, 1,685 graduate students, 193 tenure-track faculty, 125 non-tenure track faculty, and 130 staff.

Like all colleges across Northeastern, the College of Science seeks opportunities to leverage the global network for teaching, learning, and research collaborations. One example is Mills College at Northeastern University, a college on the Oakland campus in the network that has embraced the biosciences as a core area of focus and expands the College of Science's reach beyond Boston.

Academic Programs

The College of Science offers a range of undergraduate and graduate programs, many with an interdisciplinary focus. The college is made up of 12 departments and programs: behavioral neuroscience, biochemistry, bioinformatics, biology, biotechnology, chemistry and chemical biology, linguistics, mathematics, marine and environmental science, physics, psychology, and premed & prehealth. In addition to traditional bachelor, master, and doctoral degrees, the college also offers 15 graduate level certificate programs reinforcing Northeastern's commitment to lifelong learning and professional development.

Research

With innovation at the forefront, the College of Science works to solve crucial global challenges facing health, security, and sustainability with groundbreaking fundamental and applied research. By harnessing powerful tools and algorithms, researchers decode scientific complexities faster and at greater scale proving that the new, data-driven frontier has emerged and that scientists are empowered to transform our understanding of the world. 15 of Northeastern's 37 interdisciplinary research centers and institutes are housed in the College of Science, positioning them to be leaders in the next era of discovery. All research centers and institutes at Northeastern represent flagship initiatives of the research enterprise to drive growth and ignite transformation. In the College of Science, research centers and institutes explore the frontier of science, from interdisciplinary, cross-sector teams working on societal changes with wide-ranging applications to groups with a more singular focus. Learn more about the research and impact of Northeastern's research centers and institutes here.

Experiential Learning

A hallmark of a Northeastern education, the College of Science offers a number of experiential learning opportunities for students. Founded over a century ago, Northeastern's co-op program is one of such opportunities. By alternating semesters of academic study with periods of full-time work, students are able to experience work across academic and professional contexts, explore or refine potential career paths, make valuable industry connections, broaden perspectives, and acquire the skills and knowledge needed to succeed.

The College of Science promotes a global perspective and as such encourages students to consider global learning experiences. Students study at universities abroad, work for foreign companies, perform service projects in nations around the world, and conduct research on a global scale all while being immersed in the local language and culture. Options for a global experience include traditional study abroad, global co-op opportunities, and the signature Dialogue of Civilizations - faculty-led educational experiences offered in the summer semester that bring students to a different country for 30 days.

A third experiential learning opportunity available to College of Science students are service-learning opportunities. Combining academics with civic responsibility, service-learning opportunities marry the real needs of society with challenging coursework. Courses, co-ops, internships, and research assignments engage students in faculty coordinated service projects. Students gain insight through formal, structured reflection and gain practical experience while making a difference in society.

THE ROLE OF THE DEAN

As the chief academic and executive officer of the college, the Dean of the College of Science reports to the Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and serves alongside the other deans and the Chancellor as a member of Northeastern's academic leadership team. The dean holds ultimate responsibility for the college's human capital - its faculty, staff, students - as well as its long-term planning and material resources, both physical and fiscal. The dean operates in a hybrid responsibility center management (RCM) university-wide budgeting model, and as such is responsible for the college's revenue streams, fundraising, and overall financial health, while sharing some central services at the university level.

The dean plays a critical role in promoting the College of Science externally, with public- and private-sector partners at the local, state, national, and international levels. The dean is the primary advocate and champion for the college internally, garnering support from university leadership for large-scale initiatives and to seed collaborations that break through academic siloes. Importantly, the dean is not just the dean in Boston, but across the whole Northeastern global campus network and will advance College of Science programs, partnerships, and research across the entirety of the university ecosystem and the markets it occupies.

Reporting directly to the dean are associate deans for academic affairs, PhD programs and graduate affairs, research, professional programs and lifelong learning, equity and teaching, administration and finance, and the global university. Six academic department chairs in chemistry and chemical biology, psychology, biology, mathematics, marine and environmental sciences, and physics complete the leadership team.

KEY OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR THE DEAN

Deans at Northeastern are considered true institutional leaders and intellectual partners with the President, Provost, Chancellor, and other deans. The university eschews incremental measures of progress in lieu of creativity, nimbleness, and transformational change among its leadership ranks. To that end, the dean will address the following opportunities and challenges:

Define a pioneering strategy for the college in alignment with Northeastern's ambitious vision.

The incoming dean will lead the college in formulating an inspired and forward-thinking strategy for the future, creating innovative programs and initiatives that capitalize on their strengths and potential, while staying attuned to Northeastern's