His Highness Dr Shaikh Sultan Bin Mohammad Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council, Ruler of Sharjah and President of the American University of Sharjah, recently approved appointments of three senior officials.
AUS Chancellor Dr Peter Heath announced that Dr Thomas John Hochstettler was nam;ed Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, Dr Nada Mourtada-Sabbah as Vice Chancellor for Development and Alumni Affairs, and Prof Peter A Di Sabatino as Dean of the School of Architecture and Design (SA&D).
History expert
Dr Hochstettler is currently completing his fifth year as President of Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon, USA. He has a broad background in higher education that spans financial and strategic planning, institutional and academic development, fund-raising, and scholarly research and teaching as a historian.
He was a teaching and research fellow in the department of history at Stanford University from 1978 to 1980. He subsequently served in various senior positions at Stanford University, Bowdoin College and the University of Houston System. In 1996 Dr Hochstettler joined Rice University as associate provost and adjunct lecturer in history. From 1998 to 2004, he served as vice president for academic affairs and visiting professor of history at Jacobs University (previously International University Bremen).
Throughout his career Dr Hochstettler has made presentations on early modern German and European military history and German-US. educational cooperation and European postsecondary education. His scholarship extends to contemporary higher education topics including enrollment management, technology and liberal learning.
Rising through the ranks
Dr Mourtada-Sabbah was one of the pioneer faculty members who joined AUS when it opened its doors in 1997. She was subsequently elected president of the AUS Faculty Senate, and served as the Chair of the Department of International Studies for three years, successfully overseeing its accreditation. She was appointed Assistant to the Chancellor for Development and Alumni Affairs in 2007.
Prof Mourtada was promoted through the ranks at AUS from Assistant Professor to Full Professor of Political Science and International Studies. She is the recipient of the AUS Excellence in Teaching Award and the AUS Excellence in Service Award. She received a BA with distinction from the American University in Beirut and holds a PhD in Public Law with distinction from the University of Paris II.
She has held visiting professorships at major universities and research institutions in the US and Europe, including the Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies at American University in Washington, DC; the University of California at Berkeley; the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; the Congressional Research Service; the University of Paris Law School; and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris.
Advancing architecture
Prof Di Sabatino is currently professor and department chair at the Art Centre College of Design in Pasadena, California. Prior to that, he served for over 11 years as a faculty member at Woodbury University in the School of Architecture and Design. He has been a visiting professor at the Politecnico di Milano, Italy, and a visiting professor and consultant at both the National Institute of Design, India, and the Creative i-College, India.
Di Sabatino is a licensed architect and has practiced in a variety of firms. Prior to re-establishing his own practice, he was the director of design at WET Design, where he oversaw all design-related activities of the firm, and led a comprehensive, interdisciplinary group of designers from the fields of architecture, landscape design, environmental design, product design, graphic and media design, illustration and fine arts.
