Jenni Evans - Interim Director of the Penn State Institute for Cyberscience (ICS)
January 2016
Please see the memo below from Neil Sharkey.
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DATE: January 13, 2016
FROM: Neil A. Sharkey
TO: Academic Leadership Council
President's Council
ICS Faculty and Staff
RCCI Executive Committee
University Research Council
SUBJ: Interim Director of the Penn State Institute for Cyberscience (ICS)
I am pleased to announce that Jenni L. Evans, Professor of Meteorology, has accepted the position of interim director of Penn State's Institute for Cyberscience, effective February 1, 2016.
Jenni is taking over for Padma Raghavan who is stepping down as the founding Director of ICS to become Vice Provost for Research at Vanderbilt University. Evans will assume responsibilities for the management and direction of ICS while we conduct a national search for the next permanent director of this vitally important Penn State Institute.
Dr. Evans received her B.Sc. (Honors) and Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Monash University in 1984 and 1990 respectively. She served as visiting scientist with the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California and as research scientist with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Melbourne, Australia before being appointed as an assistant professor of Meteorology at Penn State University in 1992. Jenni was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 1998 and full professor in 2005, with a joint appointment in the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute. She served as interim director of the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute in 2013 and as interim director of the Penn State Institutes for Energy and Environment during the 2014-15 academic year.
Dr. Evan's research interests are organized around the themes of tropical cyclones, tropical convection and climate change. She is a member of a small group of scientists who recognized and developed the research area of extratropical transition of tropical cyclones, and the forecasting tool she developed during that effort is actively used by the U.S. and Canadian National Hurricane Centers as well as the U.S. Air Force Weather Squadron, the Joint (U.S. Navy/Air Force) Typhoon Warning Center, and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and Japanese Meteorological Agency. Her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, NASA, the EPA and the U.S. Navy. Dr. Evans has served as the Professional Team Lead Meteorologist for the Florida Commission for Hurricane Loss Projection Methodology since 2003, and in 2010 she was elected a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society.
Jenni has a strong background in advanced computational modeling and proven administrative experience. She will do a great job keeping ICS on track during the search of a new director.
The official announcement as PDF.