President Johnsen announces Dr. Cathy Sandeen as next UAA chancellor

Dear UAA Community -

I am pleased to announce that Dr. Cathy Sandeen will serve as the next chancellor of the University of Alaska Anchorage, and will begin her tenure on September 15.

Dr. Sandeen is currently chancellor of the University of Wisconsin Colleges and the University of Wisconsin-Extension, which combined employ 2,200 faculty and staff and have an annual operating budget of $350 million. During her tenure, she managed the reorganization of both institutions' structure and operations and has championed strategic innovation and entrepreneurial programs. You can read her full CV here.

For those of you who had the opportunity to meet and talk with Dr. Sandeen during her visit to campus, I believe she demonstrated an understanding of the range of issues facing UAA, and made it clear that she is committed to supporting UAA's faculty, alumni and the entire UAA community.

For those of you who did not have the chance to meet her, she will be on campus several times this summer for transition purposes before assuming her full duties in September.

In joining our leadership team, our new chancellor will bring a great perspective on engaging faculty and staff on strategies to increase enrollment and student success. Of equal importance will be the relationships that Dr. Sandeen will establish with UAA's alumni community and the Anchorage community. As the role of higher education becomes more important in the preparation of Alaska's future leaders, these relationships will be imperative to strengthen the institution. I am confident that her many years of experience in leadership positions at universities around the country will benefit UAA.

UAA is a great university poised for growth in meeting the higher education needs of our students, our region, and our state.

I invite you to read the short message below from Dr. Sandeen to the UAA community and view her video greeting. I hope you will join me in welcoming Dr. Sandeen as we start the next new chapter in UAA's history.

Sincerely,

Jim Johnsen President, University of Alaska

Greeting Message from Dr. Sandeen

To my new colleagues,

As you now know, President Johnsen recently named me as the next chancellor of the University of Alaska Anchorage.

I wanted to reach out right away to express how honored I am to be joining you and how excited I am about the possibilities for the future of UAA. During my visit to Anchorage, including my conversations with community and campus leaders, the optimistic, forward-looking spirit of the students, faculty, staff, and community members was unmistakable-and impressed me deeply.

I've prepared a brief video "hello" that you can access here.

I look forward to joining you officially this fall. In the meantime, I plan to make several visits to begin the process of listening and learning and hope I will have the opportunity to meet and interact with many of you.

With very best regards, Cathy Sandeen

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Related: Press release from UA Statewide announcing Dr. Sandeen as next UAA chancellor.

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