Celebrating Our President

Havidán Rodríguez is inaugurated as the University’s 20th President.

Facts concerning UAlbany presidents and inaugurations: left to right, David Page, the institution's first leader, and inaugural traditions of the mace, regalia and presidential medallion.

ALBANY, N.Y. (April 12, 2018) — Havidán Rodríguez became UAlbany’s 20th President in September. Friday will be the day to celebrate, with an inauguration at 2 p.m. at the Performing Arts Center’s Main Theatre.

The day begins less formally, with a coffee hour at 9:30 a.m. in the Campus Center food court area. Everyone is welcome to share refreshments with the president and executive committee, and University faculty, staff and students.

The official promotion for the Inauguration.

The 2 p.m. investiture ceremony at the PAC will begin with a procession of faculty and delegates in full regalia. President Rodríguez will speak about his priorities for the University in the coming years.

You can register to attend the ceremony at www.albany.edu/inauguration. For those who cannot join us onsite, we will live stream the ceremony here. Following the ceremony, there will be a reception with light refreshments in the Lecture Center concourse.

About Dr. Havidán Rodríguez

Dr. Rodríguez came to UAlbany with 25 years of leadership in higher education. He was the founding provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, a new public research university formed by combining The University of Texas at Brownsville and The University of Texas Pan-American, where Rodríguez was interim president, provost and vice president for academic affairs.

Prior to his time in Texas, Rodríguez spent seven years at the University of Delaware — as deputy provost, vice provost for academic affairs and international programs, and professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice. He also was a core faculty member and director of the university’s Disaster Research Center, the first social science research center in the world devoted to the study of disasters.

Rodríguez held faculty and administrative positions at the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez for over a decade; served as Director of the Minority Affairs Program for the American Sociological Association; and was a visiting professor at the University of Michigan’s Population Fellow’s Program.

A respected scholar who studies the socio-economic impacts of disasters and the economic well-being of minority populations in the United States and Puerto Rico, Rodríguez is also a strong advocate for involving undergraduates in research.

A native of Puerto Rico, Rodríguez received his Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology from the University of Maryland, his M.A. in Sociology from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

He and his wife, Rosy Lopez, have three grown children.

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