Kyle Squires has been named dean of the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University. Squires was named by the provost following a national search in which his plans to elevate the Fulton Schools’ global connections and emphasize innovation among students and researchers set him apart from other candidates.
“Kyle has distinguished himself as a leader, a researcher and a professor. He brings to this deanship the perfect combination of experience that our engineering programs need as they develop the inventors and problem-solvers of the future,” said ASU President Michael M. Crow. “He has played a fundamental role in developing the educational excellence of our engineering program, and he understands where we need to take the Fulton Schools to provide the maximum benefit for the state and the nation.”
With an established record in research leadership and academic administration, Squires has served as vice dean and interim dean of the Fulton Schools and their 19,000 graduate and undergraduate students since June 2015, when then-Dean Paul Johnson was appointed president of the Colorado School of Mines. Over the next five years, Squires plans changes and initiatives that will raise the profile and impact of the Fulton Schools worldwide.
Central to this effort will be the creation of a Fulton Innovation Institute. This institute will allow the Fulton Schools of Engineering to scale its research enterprise creating an unparalleled innovation engine for the state and the region. By building on existing areas of excellence like cybersecurity, advanced communications and robotics and rehabilitation, the institute can substantially increase the impact of the Fulton Schools.
Squires plans to capitalize on the continued record enrollment in the Fulton Schools, allowing him to drive educational innovation at scale to deliver high-quality engineering degree programs online. Those steps will provide access to an exceptional engineering education to all.
“Over the next five years, our goal is to achieve global leadership in engineering education,” Squires said. “That means, people will not only admire and recognize what we do, they will adopt our methods and emulate our organization. Continued investment in the Fulton Schools of Engineering will pay dividends to ASU and the state in terms of use-inspired solutions and the preparation of a high-tech workforce.”
A Stanford-trained PhD, Squires’ expertise centers on fluid dynamics, turbulence modeling and high-performance computing. His work has helped improve aerodynamics and has broad impact in a wide range of applications ranging from jet aircraft performance to sports equipment. He taught mechanical engineering at the University of Vermont before joining ASU in 1997, and since then he has held a series of progressive leadership positions, including chair of the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, director of the School for Engineering of Matter, Transport and Energy, and most recently, vice dean and interim dean of the Fulton Schools. He has held visiting appointments in the U.S., Japan and France and was elected a fellow of the American Physical Society in 2008.
While interim dean, Squires steered the Fulton Schools’ continued growth in enrollment, diversity initiatives, freshman retention and strategic faculty hires. He has been actively engaged in increasing the scale and visibility of the Schools’ entrepreneurial programs and is working to promote an entrepreneurial mind-set and culture among the faculty and students in the Fulton Schools.
“The Fulton Schools have created an environment in which faculty can be nimble and quickly test new ideas in the classroom, and Kyle has played an important part in the establishment of that environment,” said Mark Searle, executive vice president and university provost. “That energy draws high-quality faculty whose enthusiasm, in turn, drives students to pursue their own passions.”
Squires has overseen the kickoff of two new Engineering Research Centers. Funded by the National Science Foundation, these enterprises are devoted to solving some of the world’s most challenging problems. These awards recognize ASU’s exceptional faculty and its ability to form interdisciplinary, multi-institution teams and make ASU one of two universities in the U.S. leading two ERCs while also partnering on a third Engineering Research Center led by Rice University.
The Fulton Schools’ focused growth in key research areas will elevate ASU nationally and globally, and result in increased recognition of students, faculty and programs.
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