Keller leaves Rice engineering for STPI in Washington, D.C.

By Seth Brown     8/19/10 7:00pm

From health to cybersecurity, nanoscience to sustainability, Dean of Engineering Sallie Keller will have to deal with a wide range of issues when she moves to Washington, D.C. in September to serve as the director of the Science and Technology Policy Institute. "I've spent my whole career at some level involved in science and technology policy," Keller, a statistics professor, said. "I spent time out at Los Alamos, and I've been involved in organizations involved in major policy issues."

As the director of the STPI, Keller's responsibilities will include working with the president's science advisor and his staff in the Office of Science and Technology Policy, which advises the White House on science and technology policy issues, and directing the work of the STPI.

"I have to try to understand the audience and their backgrounds," Keller said. "I have to figure out how to put things in the context that someone is familiar with what you're trying to convey to them."

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Keller said that she hopes to both continue some of her own work in statistics and build up a stronger statistical capability in the STPI.

One of the biggest challenges in her new job is being in the right place at the right time, Keller said.

"We need to help OSTP be ahead so they're ready to ask the right questions at the right time - not simply to respond, but to help direct a little bit," Keller said. "By the time a really significant question comes up to Congress, it's almost too late to answer it - if we anticipate it, we will be doing a really great job."

President David Leebron said that Keller brought a focus to the teaching of engineering at Rice. He said that her legacy at Rice also includes the number of faculty she has recruited and the creation of the Center for Engineering Leadership and the Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen.

"There are few things that we've done that have had as much impact per dollar spent," Leebron said of the Center for Engineering Leadership and the OEDK. "Five years is about the average term for a dean, but I think [Keller] had well above an average engagement with alumni and others."

While the search for a new dean is in progress, Electrical and Computer Engineering Professor C. Sidney Burrus will serve as interim dean. Burrus was the dean of engineering from 1998-2005.

Leebron said that the engineering school needs to continue on its current trajectory for the future and continue in building a good relationship with the Texas Medical Center.

"I think engineering will remain one of the crown jewels of Rice," Leebron said. "I'm sorry to lose Sallie, but nobody has any doubt that we're going to be able to recruit an extraordinary new dean."

As for the new dean, Leebron said it will need to be someone able to enhance Rice's international reputation and who has a clear vision for the school.

"[The new dean needs to be] someone who brings a vision of the potential of the school and the ability to implement it," Leebron said. "Someone who can build relationships with the faculty and understands Rice's commitment to quality of education."

Lovett College junior Laura Campos said that she and several other members of the Society for Hispanic Professional Engineers met with Keller last year to brainstorm ideas to increase student involvement with the organization.

"She was very open," Campos, an environmental engineering major, said. "She gave us different ideas - one was to talk to people in other colleges and see if they might transfer to Rice, and to talk to freshmen."

Campos said that the next dean should be a good decision maker and should push the engineering department to adapt new technologies.

"He should be forward and strong in decision making, and should push engineering to the newest things," Campos said.

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