Worcester Polytechnic Institute announced today that, following an international search, Mimi Sheller, PhD, head of the department of sociology at Drexel University and a distinguished and internationally recognized scholar and educational leader, will join the university in July as the inaugural dean of The Global School. Sheller, co-founder of the interdisciplinary field known as mobilities research, arrives after 15 years of executive leadership of academic units, research centers, and professional organizations.
“Mimi Sheller brings to WPI a wealth of experience in creating and sustaining global education and research enterprises and global partnerships, with a particular focus on building a more socially just and equitable world by merging the problem-solving skills of the STEM disciplines with the human perspective of the social sciences and the humanities,” said WPI President Laurie Leshin. “With her depth of knowledge of global issues, her extensive network of collaborators around the world, and her pioneering research in mobility justice, she will help the university build on its successes in global project-based learning to create a new model for applied global scholarship and education.”