UW News

January 14, 2013

Robert Stacey selected as dean of College of Arts and Sciences

News and Information

Bob StaceyRobert C. Stacey, professor of history at the University of Washington and currently the interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, has been selected as the next dean of the college, effective Feb. 15, 2013, UW President Michael K. Young and Provost Ana Mari Cauce announced today. The appointment is subject to approval of the Board of Regents.

“Bob Stacey has excelled at everything he has been asked to do at the university, and I am I confident he will also do so as dean of our largest and in many ways most complex college,” said Young. “The college has a history of growing its own leadership. We conducted a broad national search for the dean, and happily Bob emerged as the best candidate. I’m pleased for him and delighted for students and faculty in the college.”

Stacey has been at the UW since 1988, when he joined the faculty of the Department of History as assistant professor. He became associate professor in 1990 and was promoted to full professor in 1996.

Stacey served as chair of the UW Jewish Studies Program from 1994 to 1997. He chaired the Department of History from 1997 to 2002, and he was a divisional dean for social sciences from 2003 to 2005 and for the arts and humanities from 2007 to 2011. He has served as interim dean of the college since January 2012.

As dean of the UW’s largest college, Stacey is responsible for 38 academic units with more than 800 full-time faculty and an annual instruction and research budget of about $290 million.

As interim dean, Stacey has targeted $10 million in new instructional resources to the college’s departments to expand access to high-demand classes and improve the quality of the undergraduate education experience. He also has worked with the central administration of the university to develop a new salary plan for the college’s faculty and staff. Under his leadership, the college is preparing to launch new undergraduate interdisciplinary majors in Integrated Sciences, Cinema and Media Studies, Humanities, and Science, Society and Health.

He also has launched aggressive faculty hiring programs with special focus on supporting natural sciences departments and university-level initiatives.  He has worked with student leadership to create a new Arts and Sciences Advisory Council for Students, which will have input on major college budget decisions.

Stacey’s research has focused on medieval England. He also has written extensively about the place of Jews in medieval English society. He is the author of four books, with three more in progress, as well as numerous scholarly articles.

Stacey has served on many administrative committees and currently chairs the Advisory Committee on Intercollegiate Athletics.

His annual salary will be $300,000.

The College of Arts and Sciences provides a liberal arts education of tremendous breadth and depth to more than 27,000 students while advancing research and serving as a resource for the community. The college has four academic divisions: arts, humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences. With more than 7,000 courses offered in the college annually, students can study everything from art to physics.