Appointment: Professor Cheryl Regehr as Provost and Vice-President

Memorandum to:   Governing Council

Members of the Academic Board

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President, UTFA

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From:                       David Naylor

                                 President

Date:                        April 10, 2013

Re:                           Appointment of Professor Cheryl Regehr as Provost and Vice-President

                                                                                                                                               

I am very pleased to announce that, at its meeting yesterday afternoon, the Governing Council approved the appointment of Professor Cheryl Regehr as Vice-President and Provost for a term beginning September 2nd, 2013 and continuing until February 28th, 2015, or until the position is filled following the customary search/review process.

Professor Regehr is well known to our community from her outstanding work as Vice Provost – Academic Programs, a new role she has defined and held since its inception in July 2009.   However, it seems only appropriate to reintroduce her at this time. 

Professor Regehr earned her BA in Psychology from Wilfrid Laurier University in 1978 and went on to complete her Master of Social Work at the University of Toronto in 1980. She then embarked on a career as a social worker, serving in multiple institutions with increasing responsibility as a practitioner and program leader, and establishing special expertise in the area of recovery from psychological trauma. 

After some years, Professor Regehr returned to the University and received her Doctor of Philosophy in 1995.  She joined the Faculty of Social Work at Wilfrid Laurier University that year.  In 1999, Professor Regehr moved back to the University of Toronto, and was appointed full Professor by 2004, with cross-appointments in the Faculty of Law and the Institute of Medical Sciences. 

In the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work Professor Regehr held the Sandra Rotman Chair in Social Work from 2003 to 2009, and filled multiple leadership roles before becoming Dean in January 2006.  These included directing the Centre for Applied Social Research, the Research Institute for Evidenced Based Social Work, the Centre for Excellence for Child Welfare, and the JD/MSW Program.  

To this day Professor Regehr has sustained an active program of award-winning research.  She continues to publish actively, and serves on peer-review committees and editorial boards in her areas of expertise.  She has been supported as a principal investigator or co-investigator on grants by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada more or less continuously for over 15 years.  The co-author of four books and over 100 journal articles, she was also a three-time winner of the Faculty of Social Work's Teacher of the Year award.  

As Vice-Provost, Academic Programs Professor Regehr has been a key member of the Provost’s leadership team, working with varied constituencies across all three campuses and serving on the board of the University Health Network.  Professor Regehr has done transformative work in the challenging area of quality assurance and standards, enhancing and streamlining the approaches taken by the province, the Council of Ontario Universities, and our own institution.  She has taken a leading role in the University’s growing move to embrace novel methodologies for on-line learning.  More generally, the Provost-designate has been active as an assessor to the Academic Board and its Committee on Academic Policy and Programs, participated in collective bargaining, facilitated cross-faculty interdisciplinary initiatives, and been active in formulating University-wide guidelines on a range of matters.  Even as she has built bridges internally, Cheryl Regehr has shown an unusual ability to navigate the external landscape.  She has won friends for the University and positively influenced decision-makers as both earlier as a Dean and more recently as a Vice-Provost.

In short, Professor Regehr has an outstanding record as a leader, administrator, researcher, scholar, teacher, and practitioner.  Given these considerable accomplishments, it was unsurprising that, on the basis of extensive consultations with a wide range of constituencies, the Advisory Committee concluded that Professor Regehr is an academic leader particularly well-suited to serve as Provost during this transitional period. 

The President-designate and I strongly concur with the Advisory Committee’s assessment.  The 18 month term is designed to ensure continuity of strong leadership while we are in the midst of an administrative transition. Professor Regehr will remain eligible to seek reappointment to the role, as President Gertler begins to shape his own leadership team.

Please join us in congratulating Professor Regehr and welcoming her to this new role.