President's Cabinet

Philip Clay serves as WPI’s Senior Vice President for Student Affairs and Enrollment Management. A seasoned higher education professional, Philip Clay has worked in student affairs for 36 years. Vice President Clay oversees an array of student services and programs designed to support WPI’s 6,900 full and part time undergraduate and graduate students. He is responsible for the leadership of the Student Affairs Division which includes Physical Education, Recreation, and Athletics, Rubin Campus Center and Student Activities, Residential and Dining Services, Health Services, Student Development ...

Bryce Hoffman leads WPI's team of marketing and communications experts, who work with the university community to build and amplify the WPI brand. Bryce came to WPI from the University of New Hampshire, where he was Assistant Vice President for Integrated Marketing. There, he led the largest market research project in the university's history and established new brand positioning while overseeing marketing strategy, analytics, agency relationships and brand advertising. He previously served in senior leadership roles at UMass Lowell and SUNY Plattsburgh, and as a writer and strategist at ...

Vijay Menta is WPI’s Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer. He oversees Network Operations, Systems Services, Application Administration, Data Architecture, Enterprise Resource Planning, Support Services, Project Management, Academic Technologies, Research Computing, and IT Security for WPI community and plays a major role in the strategic initiatives of the university. Vijay joined WPI from Middlebury College where he was the Vice President & CIO. While there, he directed the completion of the Oracle Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) project for the ...

The holistic WPI experience, both inside and outside the classroom, is a phenomenal learning laboratory that can prepare students for their future lives as leaders and citizens. At WPI, students have the opportunity to take risks, try new skills and opportunities, and to learn from them. The spirit of collaboration, value for student input, and culture of innovation makes WPI a place where students can build meaningful relationships with students, faculty, and staff who share their passions and interests. I am committed to ensuring that students make meaning of their curricular and ...

Andrew Sears, PhD, is Provost and Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs and professor in the Department of Computer Science at WPI. Building on more than 30 years of higher education experience, Sears brings a unique blend of technical expertise, administrative excellence, and collaborative leadership style to his role as the university's chief academic officer. Immediately prior to joining WPI, Sears served as Professor and Dean of the School of Information Studies at Syracuse University, where he focused on supporting interdisciplinary efforts that produced new academic programs and ...

Matthew Thaler serves as WPI’s Vice President & General Counsel.   As General Counsel, Matt advises university clients on a broad range of issues affecting higher education, including litigation and dispute resolution, enterprise risk management, student affairs, research and intellectual property, federal and state policy compliance, labor and employment, contract negotiations, and institutional governance.  He brings more than two decades of legal experience spanning private practice, industry leadership, and higher education. He has served WPI in the Office of the General Counsel ...

Since January 2022, Lauren Turner has served as senior vice president of talent and inclusion at WPI. Reporting directly to the President, she oversees all aspects of WPI’s human resources and employee engagement and inclusion functions, including compensation, benefits, talent acquisition, performance management, learning and development, organizational development, employee engagement, labor relations, and employee relations, HR information systems, data and analytics. WPI employs about 1,200 faculty and staff and serves about 7,000 undergraduate and graduate students.Before being appointed ...

Bogdan Vernescu is Professor of mathematical sciences and the Vice President and Vice Provost for Research and Innovation.His research is in applied mathematics for multiscale materials sciences, focusing on the characterization of material properties of composites, porous media, suspensions, emulsions and electrorheological/magnetorheological materials. He has published over 60 research papers, a monograph and a proceedings volume. He has held visiting positions at MIT, in France at the University of Metz, University of Nancy, University of Savoie, University Jean-Monnet-Saint-Étienne, ...