Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Emily A. Carter Stepping Down to Refocus on Climate Change Mitigation at Princeton

Campus Update

Chancellor Block sent the following message to the UCLA campus community.

Dear Bruin Community:

Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Emily A. Carter has informed me of her decision to step down and return to Princeton University, where she will become the inaugural senior strategic advisor for sustainability science at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, one of the U.S. Department of Energy’s national laboratories. There, she will provide leadership in the science and technology of sustainability, carbon management and geoengineering. In addition to her administrative post there, she will also return to the faculty and serve as the Gerhard R. Andlinger ‘52 Professor in Energy and the Environment as well as professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment.

Emily expressed to me an urgency to refocus her expertise and attention on the pressing issue of climate change mitigation. I respect her decision. Her last official day at UCLA will be December 9.

While I am saddened to see her go, I am grateful for Emily’s significant contributions to UCLA. Her wise counsel, partnership and innovative thinking have helped us navigate one of our greatest ongoing challenges: the COVID-19 pandemic.

Emily’s leadership has played a critical role in helping move UCLA forward in other ways as well. She and her team launched several important initiatives, including a summer research fellowship program that allowed doctoral students in need to accelerate their degree progress; actions supporting the growth of UCLA’s intellectual community devoted to Black life as detailed in our Rising to the Challenge messages; substantial commitments designed to help UCLA achieve and maintain designation as a Hispanic-Serving Institution; professional development programs for department chairs and senior leadership; and improvements to numerous administrative policies and processes, informed by 32 unit-level strategic plans completed last fall. Emily also broadened the scope of the Sustainable LA Grand Challenge, helped launch the DataX initiative, laid the groundwork for a cross-campus initiative to advance faculty diversity, and appointed a diverse team of 10 outstanding senior academic and administrative leaders. Emily’s contributions will clearly have a lasting influence on UCLA and I have no doubt that her future contributions at Princeton will be similarly impactful.

Soon we hope to undertake a search for Emily’s successor. Following her departure in December, Vice Chancellor for Academic Personnel Michael S. Levine will serve as interim executive vice chancellor and provost for the remainder of the academic year. As many of you know, Michael previously served in this interim role in 2019. A transition period will begin in October and we will identify an interim leader to take over Michael’s responsibilities in the Academic Personnel Office during this time.

Please join me in thanking Emily for her service to UCLA and wishing her all the best in her roles back at Princeton.

Sincerely,