Appointees Add Experience and Diversity to CUNY Leadership
(L-R: Robin L. Garrell, Frank H. Wu, Daisy Cocco De Filippis)
The Board of Trustees of The City University of New York today voted to appoint distinguished leaders from across the country as presidents of The Graduate Center and Queens College and as interim president of Hostos Community College. The appointments fill vacancies in the top leadership positions of three distinct CUNY institutions representing the range of educational opportunity provided by the nation’s leading urban public university.
To lead The Graduate Center — CUNY’s prestigious hub of research and graduate education for the public good — the Trustees appointed Robin L. Garrell, vice provost for graduate education and graduate division dean at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. Garrell, whose academic background is in biochemistry and engineering, will lead a center with over 3,500 students in 31 doctoral and 16 master’s programs. The Graduate Center, located in midtown Manhattan, has 134 core faculty, joined by 1,750 additional faculty members drawn from CUNY’s colleges and New York City’s cultural and scientific institutions. Dr. Garrell will succeed Interim President James L. Muyskens.
The Board named as president of Queens College Frank H. Wu, the former chancellor of the University of California, Hastings College of the Law, where he is currently a distinguished professor. Mr Wu will be the first Asian-American to serve as the president of Queens, a four-year college with almost 20,000 students from over 150 countries and a national reputation for its liberal arts and sciences and preprofessional programs. He will be CUNY’s second Asian-American college president following the University’s appointment last month of Dr. S. David Wu, the incoming president of Baruch College. The college was previously led by CUNY’s Chancellor, Félix V. Matos Rodríguez, who was named to the University’s top post in 2019 after five years as president at Queens. Mr. Wu succeeds Interim President William Tramontano.
To serve as the interim president of Eugenio María de Hostos Community College, the trustees named Dr. Daisy Cocco De Filippis, president of Naugatuck Valley Community College in Connecticut. Dr. De Filippis will be the first Dominican woman to serve as president of a CUNY college. She is a CUNY alumna and former provost at Hostos, one of CUNY’s seven community colleges and an important educational anchor in the Bronx for more than 50 years. Dr. De Fillipis will succeed Hostos President David Gómez, who recently announced his plans to retire.
“These are three outstanding leaders who bring not only exceptional credentials and deep experience, but the kind of diverse backgrounds and experiences that make them perfect choices for the nation’s largest public urban University,”said Chairperson William C. Thompson Jr.“Each of these accomplished educators has demonstrated a commitment to advancing opportunity for students and the vision to lead their campuses into the future as we emerge from the COVID-19 emergency and continue our pursuit of the University’s vital mission for the people of New York.”
“I am thrilled that our national searches brought us such dynamic educators and leaders as we look to rebound from the challenges of these uncertain times,”said Chancellor Félix V. Matos Rodríguez.“Robin Garrell is a brilliant scientist with a track record of increasing diversity and inclusiveness among the ranks of graduate students. Frank Wu is a trailblazer in legal education who has broken barriers for Asian-Americans. And I am delighted to welcome back Daisy Cocco De Filippis, a pioneer in Dominican studies who had great success advancing opportunities for low-income students in Connecticut.”
Robin L. Garrellwill head CUNY’s Graduate Center after nine years as vice provost of the Graduate Division of UCLA, where she has had campus-wide responsibility for nearly 12,000 academic and professional graduate students and postdoctoral scholars. Dr. Garrell earned her Ph.D. in macromolecular science and engineering from the University of Michigan and, in addition to her leadership post at UCLA, she has been a professor of chemistry since 2003 and professor of bioengineering since 2013. She previously taught at the University of Pittsburgh.
Dr. Garrell has been noted throughout her career for advancing diversity, and since her appointment as Vice Provost and Dean, enrollment in UCLA’s graduate and professional degree programs by members of historically underrepresented groups have increased 40 percent. She has served as Chair of the Faculty Executive Committee of the UCLA College and of the UCLA Academic Senate. As a research scientist, Dr. Garrell leads UCLA in the NSF Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate – California Alliance, and is a member of the Biomedical Engineering faculty and California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI). Dr. Garrell also serves as an elected commissioner on the Western Association of Schools and Colleges Senior Colleges and University Commission and the Educational Testing Service’s Graduate Record Examination and Test of English as a Foreign Language advisory boards.
She will begin her tenure at The Graduate Center August 1.
“I am honored to be chosen to serve as the next President of the CUNY Graduate Center, which is world-renowned for its exceptional scholarship and public-facing research,” Dr. Garrell said. “I am excited to lead a center that serves as a national model for graduate education in an urban setting, preparing diverse students to become leaders in innovation, public service and research who will shape the city, region and nation for years to come.”
Frank H. Wucomes to Queens College after a tenure as William L. Prosser distinguished professor at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, where he also served as chancellor and dean from 2010 through 2015. Prior to those posts, he served as dean of Wayne State University Law School in Detroit and was a professor at Howard University Law School. He was the first Asian American to serve in each of those positions. He spent a decade serving Gallaudet University — which offers higher education to deaf and hearing- impaired students- as one of the few trustees with normal hearing.
Widely published in professional journals as well as popular outlets, Mr. Wu is the author ofYellow: Race in America Beyond Black and White.Published in 2002, the book argued for a new paradigm of civil rights that goes beyond black and white and has since been widely used in Asian American academic programs. In 2013,National Juristranked Mr. Wu as the most influential dean in legal education. The son of Chinese immigrants from Taiwan, he grew up in Detroit, earned his bachelor’s degree in writing from Johns Hopkins University and his law degree from the University of Michigan. In 2008, he was the recipient of the Asian Pacific Fund Chang-Lin Tien Award, given for leadership in higher education. He recently received the John Hope Franklin Award for his commitment to diversity.
“I am honored to be coming to Queens College, a campus that represents education as the engine of the American Dream for individuals and families now more than ever,”Mr. Wu said. “I am here because my parents were immigrants who came as students. That opportunity must continue to be offered and expanded, and I look forward to working with the entire Queens College community at a time when it will be vital to be resilient—to come together and work together to meet the challenges ahead.”
He will begin his tenure at Queens College July 1.
Daisy Cocco De Filippishas been the president of Naugatuck Valley Community College in Waterbury, Conn., since 2008, a tenure that brought recognition to the school as one of the nation’s top community colleges in advancing opportunities for low-income students. Her new appointment brings her back to Hostos, where she served as provost and senior vice president for academic affairs from 2002 to 2008, and to CUNY, from which she earned her academic degrees: Bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Queens College and a Ph.D. in Spanish language and a Master of Philosophy in Spanish literature from the Graduate Center. She spent the first 20 years of her academic career at CUNY’s York College, starting as an adjunct lecturer, rising to tenured professor of Spanish before moving on to leadership roles. She served as chair of the Faculty Caucus and then Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.
Dr. De Filippis’s scholarly work is recognized internationally for pioneering the field of Dominican women studies and Dominican authors in the U.S. She was elected last year as a member of the New England Commission of Higher Education. She also serves on numerous educational boards including the Connecticut Technical Education and Career System High School Board, the Northwest Regional Workforce Investment Board, the advisory board of the Dominican Studies Institute at City College and the board of the Dominican Studies Association.
“My heart is filled with gratitude for the invitation to come home to CUNY and Hostos Community College,”Dr. De Fillipis said. “Hostos is a bridge of opportunity over the Grand Concourse that gives hope to one of the nation’s poorest communities. For 50 years it has embraced the challenge of its mission of increasing access, equity and quality. I look forward to working with talented and innovative faculty and staff on behalf of students as we bounce back from COVID-19.”
She will begin her tenure at Hostos August 1.
The City University of New York is the nation’s largest urban public university, a transformative engine of social mobility that is a critical component of the lifeblood of New York City. Founded in 1847 as the nation’s first free public institution of higher education, CUNY today hasseven community colleges,11 senior collegesandseven graduate or professional institutionsspread across New York City’s five boroughs, serving 500,000 students of all ages and awarding 55,000 degrees each year. CUNY’s mix of quality and affordability propels almost six times as many low-income students into the middle class and beyond as all the Ivy League colleges combined. More than 80 percent of the University’s graduates stay in New York, contributing to all aspects of the city’s economic, civic and cultural life and diversifying the city’s workforce in every sector. CUNY’s graduates and faculty have received many prestigious honors, including 13 Nobel Prizes and 26 MacArthur “Genius” Grants. The University’s historic mission continues to this day: provide a first-rate public education to all students, regardless of means or background.
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