[Announcement letter from Eric W. Kaler, President; and Robert J. Jones, Senior Vice President for System Academic Administration]

Dear Members of the University community:

We are pleased to announce R. Scott Studham as the University of Minnesota's new vice president and chief information officer, pending approval by the Board of Regents in February. Scott has served as the chief information officer at the University of Tennessee since 2009, where he was responsible for the strategic direction and management of the university's information resources. View his résumé.

As the new vice president and chief information officer, Scott brings his experience with enterprise application integration and enterprise resource planning implementations in complex, distributed organizations, and with implementation of technology services for multi-campus environments. He has been the project manager or chief architect for a top 10 supercomputer six times during the course of his career, and is an internationally recognized researcher in the area of high performance computing. Scott has published in CIO Magazine, Scientific Computing, and multiple IEEE peer reviewed journals, and has been called upon by the U.S. Congress to provide testimony on information security on multiple occasions.

We believe Scott has an extraordinary vision for building on the existing strengths of the Office of Information Technology (OIT) to ensure the strategic and operational excellence of both academic and administrative information technology to support and advance all aspects of the University's mission.

Scott will begin in his new position on February 13, 2012. We want to thank the vice president and chief information officer search committee, and especially co-chairs UM-Rochester Chancellor Stephen Lehmkuhle and Vice President for Human Resources Kathy Brown. We also want to thank Ann Hill Duin, associate vice president and associate chief information officer, for taking on this interim leadership role for the past six months and for continuing to serve until Scott arrives.

Finally, we express our appreciation to everyone who took the time to participate in the interviews or on-campus forums, who watched them online, or who filled out the online evaluations of the finalists. Your input was invaluable. We look forward to working with Scott, OIT, and all of you to continue to position the University of Minnesota for excellence.

Sincerely,

Eric W. Kaler
President

Robert J. Jones
Senior Vice President for System Academic Administration