Joanna Grabski will be the next dean for the College of Integrative Arts and Sciences, beginning July 1.
Grabski, currently serving as the director for the School of Art and professor of art history at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, said she is looking forward to joining the team and continuing her leadership work.
Located in Tempe, Downtown and Polytechnic, CISA offers opportunities for students to chart their own learning path and build a holistic foundation on wide-ranging subjects from math to music, she said.
"CISA is so integral to the ecosystem at ASU because there is a lot of synergy and room for creative growth through the collaboration with multiple colleges," Grabski said.
Duane Roen, the current dean for CISA and the vice provost at the Polytechnic campus, said it is a great place for students to combine various interests and see how similar they are.
"Students find the most interesting, innovative combinations you can think of like math and music. Of course, when you think about it, math and music have a lot in common," Roen said. "It's really fun watching students how they bring fields together and and become interdisciplinary thinkers and doers."
Currently, Roen and Grabski are working together in the transition process. Roen will return as a faculty member in the college and said he is excited in working and interacting with the students.
Grabski has two goals she wants to implement in CISA: more study abroad opportunities and working more with the Learning Enterprise, a new ASU initiative that helps increase accessibility to education for all learners.
"I find this to be especially critical for students who haven't had the life experience to travel abroad, or the opportunity to do so. So we're going to find other ways to make connections to create dialogues with other students to build with some of the goals that one would achieve by, by studying abroad," Grabski said.
One of the other initiatives that the college will be working on is improving justice, equity, diversity and inclusion.
Roen said the college is working on developing new degree programs, centering on race and democracy and holding events relating to the themes of JEDI.
Grabski said she is looking forward to expanding the current initiatives in the college by building partnerships with other colleges in ASU.
"There is a lot of room to advance common initiatives," Grabski said.
Reach the reporter at anatar12@asu.edu or follow @AnushaNat1 on Twitter.
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