Northeastern U. Names USC Dean as Chief
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Joseph Aoun, a linguistics scholar and dean of USC’s College of Letters, Arts & Sciences, will officially be named today as the new president of Northeastern University in Boston.
Aoun, 53, who was educated in Lebanon and France before earning his doctorate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1981, joined USC’s faculty in 1982.
He moved through various administrative positions before becoming dean of USC’s largest academic unit in July 2000.
He is moving to a 22,600-student private university, which is trying to lift its academic stature toward that of USC, which was 30th among the nation’s research universities in the most recent rankings by U.S. News & World Report.
Northeastern, perhaps best known for its cooperative education program, which enables students to alternate paid professional work experience with classroom studies, was ranked 115th in the latest U.S. News rankings.
In a brief telephone interview, Aoun said that the traditional separation of study and practice in undergraduate education “is very limiting,” and that he hopes to lead Northeastern University in taking advantage of its “competitive edge” in experiential learning.
He will replace Richard Freeland, who announced in August that he would step down.
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