Each IARU partner is represented by a Senior member of the institution. Senior Officers meet annually to discuss the strategic directions of the Alliance, to hear updates from the partner universities and to offer guidance on ongoing IARU initiatives
As Deputy Vice-Chancellor (International Strategy), Professor Wheeler is responsible for the development and implementation of the academically-led international strategy for the Australian National University (ANU). Working closely with colleagues across the University, the DVCIS provides leadership to the University's strategic engagement with global partners. Professor Wheeler has direct oversight of International Strategy & Partnerships (ISP), the ANU Liaison Offices in China and North America, and the Marketing & Student Recruitment Division, with broad oversight of Admissions Reform.
Professor Wheeler joined the University as the Dean of the ANU College of Law in early 2018, a role she continues to hold. Sally divides her time between the ANU College of Law and her role as Deputy Vice-Chancellor (International Strategy).
Prior to taking up these positions at the ANU, Sally was a Professor at Queen's University Belfast, where she served a five-year term as Head of the School of Law, and was Dean of Internationalisation for the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences from 2013-17. Professor Wheeler also served as interim Pro Vice-Chancellor of her Faculty in 2015, was Director of the Institute of Governance at Queens for five years to 2010, and was Professor of Law there from 2004. Prior to her appointment in Belfast, Professor Wheeler held notable positions in Law at both the University of Leeds, and at Birkbeck, University of London.
Professor Wheeler was elected to the Academy of Social Sciences in 2011 and to the Royal Irish Academy in 2013. In the 2017 New Years' Honours list, she was awarded an OBE for services to higher education in Northern Ireland. Professor Wheeler became a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law in 2018.
Dr. Jürg Brunnschweiler, Chief of Staff to the President
Jürg Brunnschweiler is the Chief of Staff to the President of ETH Zurich and heads the Office of the President. The Office of the President provides strategic and operational services to advance ETH Zurich and the President's vision and priorities. It is comprised of teams that are responsible for coordinating and promoting activities in the areas of Foresight and Strategic Affairs, Sustainability, International Affairs, and Global Visibility. Jürg Brunnschweiler joined ETH Zurich in 2002. Before becoming Chief of Staff to the President on 1 January 2020, he worked first in the Presidents’ Staff and the Lecturers’ Office, then in the office dealing with the European Union Framework Programmes and in 2009 returned to the Office for Faculty Affairs where he was responsible for faculty recruiting procedures at various departments. In addition, he was contact person for academic career advancement and Secretary of the Tenure Committee. In 2012, Jürg Brunnschweiler took the helm of ETH Global, the former staff unit for international relations at ETH Zurich. He is a member of the Global Advisory Board and the Board of Directors of the ETH Alumni Association. Jürg Brunnschweiler holds a PhD in Biology from the University of Zurich.
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Mr. Anders Hagström, Head of International Affairs
Anders Hagström is Head of International Affairs in the Office of the President at ETH Zurich. Before taking up his present position in 2008 he was project manager of ETH World, an ICT development program for education, research and services. Career stations before joining ETH Zurich in 1999 include various positions in the field of continuing professional development and lifelong learning for engineers at Helsinki University of Technology, the University of Cambridge and the European Federation of National Engineering Associations (FEANI).
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Associate Professor Reuben Wong, Associate Vice President, Global Relations Office
Reuben Wong is an Associate Professor jointly in the College of Alice and Peter Tan (CAPT) and the Department of Political Science in the National University of Singapore. He joined the Global Relations Office as Academic Director in 2019, and was appointed Associate Vice President (Global Relations) in January 2021.
The founding Director of Studies (2012-19) in CAPT, Reuben has been a CAPT Resident Fellow since 2019. In the Political Science Department, he held the first Jean Monnet Chair (European Integration and Foreign Policy) in Singapore with a grant from the European Commission (2013-16). He teaches inter-disciplinary modules in CAPT, international relations in Political Science, and is a Fellow in the Teaching Academy.
A former diplomat, Reuben was First Secretary in the Singapore Embassy in Paris (1995 -1998). Returning to academia, he earned an M.Phil in European Politics at Oxford, and a PhD in International Relations at the LSE on an NUS Overseas Graduate Scholarship. His publications include The Europeanization of French Foreign Policy (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), National and European Foreign Policies (Routledge, 2011), and journal articles on EU policy in ASEAN, EU-China relations, and the politics of disability. He has held visiting positions at Cambridge University (2005), the LSE (European Institute, 2008), the Stimson Center (Washington DC, 2009), the East Asian Institute (Singapore, 2011), and Humboldt University (Berlin, 2014). A Fulbright scholar, he is an Associate Fellow at the EU Centre Singapore, and Senior Research Affiliate (EU-China programme) at the College of Europe in Bruges. Reuben has served on the Council of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA, 2005-16), and is on the Board of Governors of the Singapore International Foundation (SIF, 2021-). He researches, consults and does media interviews on EU foreign relations, disability inclusion, and Singapore/SE Asian politics. Reuben speaks French, Chinese and elementary Spanish, and raises four children to help arrest Singapore's declining population.
Dr. Li Yun is Director of Office of International Relations of Peking University (PKU). She received the BA and MA from the School of International Studies, PKU and then Ph.D. in Management of Higher Education from the Graduate School of Education, PKU. Dr. Li has been working at the Office of International Relations since 2006, responsible for the exchange programs with international partners and the senior officer for IARU affairs at Peking University. From April, 2018, she also acts as the Chief for Office of General Affairs of Institute of Area Studies, Peking University.
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Prof. Lisa Alvarez-Cohen, Vice Provost for Academic Planning
Lisa Alvarez-Cohen is the Vice Provost for Academic Planning at UC Berkeley, as well as the campus Senior International Officer. She began serving in this role on July 1, 2018.
She is the Fred and Claire Sauer Professor, past-Chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and past Chair of the Faculty Senate at UC Berkeley. She received her Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering and Applied Science from Harvard University and her M.S. and Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering and Science from Stanford University. Her research areas include biotransformation and fate of environmental water contaminants, environmental microbiology and ecology, bioremediation, biological wastewater nutrient removal, and application of molecular and isotopic techniques for studying environmental microbial communities. She teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses in environmental microbiology, environmental engineering, and biological process engineering, and has co-authored the textbook Environmental Engineering Science. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. She has won a number of awards including the China 1,000 Talents National Award, the ASCE Simon W. Freese Environmental Engineering Award, the W. M. Keck Foundation Award for Engineering Teaching Excellence, and the National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award.
PhD - Environmental Engineering and Science, Stanford University
MS - Environmental Engineering and Science, Stanford University
Dr. Karen Kennedy, Director of the Strategic Partnerships Office
Karen is Director of the University of Cambridge’s Strategic Partnerships Office. The Strategic Partnerships Office provides expertise and support to the University’s key partnerships and relationships, across disciplines and across the public and private sectors.The focus is on partnerships that further the University’s academic activity and align with university priorities. These partnerships could be with a wide variety of entities, including public sector and private sector, other universities, research bodies, governments, companies, businesses, trusts and foundations.
Karen joined the University in July 2018 from the National Cancer Research Institute, where she had been Director since 2013. She has previously worked in strategic relations and programme management for research funders and scientific institutions, including Genome Canada and the Wellcome Trust. She holds a PhD in medicinal chemistry, and conducted post-doctoral research in France and at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge.
Ms. Renata Schaeffer, Head of Public International Partnerships Office
Renata Schaeffer is Head of the Public International Partnerships section within the Strategic Partnership Office at the University of Cambridge. She is responsible for developing institutional relationships with higher education and research institutions, governments, funders and NGOs internationally.
In her previous role Renata was the Assistant Director for International & EU Matters in the Research Office at the University of Cambridge where she lead the EU & International, Global Challenge Research Funds & ODA activity and the Due Diligence teams within the Research Office, overseeing Cambridge's international research grant portfolio, both operationally and at policy and strategic level.
Renata is an active member of the League of European Research Universities (LERU), which has played a key role in Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe negotiations, a member of the UKRO focus group for Horizon 2020 and has acted as an advisory member of the European Commission at various user groups. More recently Renata has also been involved in developing the University's research funding strategy post referendum. Renata is a member of the ARMA International Working Group and and the African Academy of Sciences Mentorship Scheme. Previously, between 1995 and 2001, Renata worked in finance at Daimler-Chrysler in Istanbul.
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.Ms. Carolyn Newton, Director, Global Engagement, Research Office / Office of the Vice-Chancellor
Carolyn Newton’s role as director of global engagement is focused on raising the international profile of the University of Cape Town, advising and supporting the UCT Vice-Chancellor and the Executive on a range of issues related to global strategy and visibility, and leading a team dedicated to increasing the university’s global profile through the selection and brokering of strategic international partnerships, communication and marketing of the university’s research and internationalisation efforts, and the use of research data to inform executive decisions.
Ms Newton graduated from the University of Cambridge with an MPhil in Criminology, from the University of Stellenbosch with a BA (Hons) in Journalism, and from the University of Cape Town with a BA in English. She has worked as a journalist, writer and editor in a range of media and academic publishing houses in South Africa and the UK, and in sixth-form education in Oxford before returning to Cape Town and her alma mater, UCT, in 2013. In her time at UCT she has held a series of new roles, starting with bringing a strategic research focus to the way in which UCT communicates its research, particularly to international audiences, a portfolio that expanded to include working in internationalisation, including overseeing international partnerships across the Research Office and the International Academic Programmes Office.
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.Mrs. Jette Nielsen, Head of Policy and Fora, Rector's Office
Mrs. Nielsen has built a career in education, research and innovation over 16 years at the Danish Ministry of Science and Higher Education. She has served as deputy head of a political office responsible for the development of extensive reforms in the field of education in Denmark. She also has extensive international experience and has worked for several years with EU policy and programmes within research and education. She joined the University of Copenhagen in October 2021 as Head of Policy and Fora in the Rector's office, which is responsible for, among other things, external interests, UCPH's strategy and providing advisory services to the Rector and Pro-Rectors. Mrs. Nielsen's academic background includes a Master of Science (MSc) degree in Political Science.
Mr. Andrew Brown, Senior International Officer, International Engagement Office Andrew Brown is a Senior International Officer at the University of Oxford. In addition to leading the University’s International Engagement Office, Andrew advises Pro-Vice Chancellor Professor David Gann on international strategy and helps coordinate activity across Professor Gann’s portfolio of Development and External Affairs. Prior to joining Oxford, Andrew worked in the Global Engagement Office at University College London, where he was responsible for the University’s partnerships in the Asia-Pacific.
Yuto Kitamura is a Professor at the Graduate School of Education and a Director of the Center for Advanced School Education and Evidence-Based Research at the University of Tokyo. He received his Ph.D. in Education from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He had worked as an Assistant Education Specialist at UNESCO in France and taught as an Associate Professor at Nagoya University and Sophia University in Japan. He was a Fulbright Scholar at the George Washington University, a Visiting Professor at the University of Dhaka in Bangladesh, and has been serving as a Special Advisor to the President of the Royal University of Phnom Penh in Cambodia. He is currently a Member of the Board of Education in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government and an Associate Member of the Science Council of Japan.
He specializes in comparative education and has conducted extensive research on the education policies of developing countries, particularly in Southeast Asia. His recent publications include: Education in Japan: A Comprehensive Analysis of Education Reforms and Practices (co-editor, Springer, 2019) and Memory in the Mekong: Regional Identity, Schools, and Politics in Southeast Asia (co-editor, Teachers College Press, 2022).
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Mr. Donald Filer, Associate Vice President for Global Strategy
Mr. Don Filer was appointed to his present position in December 2004. Previously, he was responsible for the managing support for the Yale Corporation, the Visitor Center, and the Office of Licensing Programs.
Prior to moving to Yale, Mr. Filer served in a number of capacities at Connecticut College from 1991 to 2000, including Vice President for Community and Public Affairs, Secretary of the College and Acting Vice President for Development. He worked for former U.S. Representative Bruce A. Morrison of New Haven from 1985 to 1991.
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