University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The Grainger College of Engineering

James J. Stukel

[title]
To James J. Stukel for contributing to the excellence in higher education as a teacher, researcher, and administrator; for helping to preserve the environment through public service; and for envisioning and implementing a mission of urban service for the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Chancellor, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois

  • MS, Mechanical Engineering, 1963
  • PhD, Mechanical Engineering, 1968

James Stukel has served the University of Illinois, the state, and the nation as a teacher, researcher, and environmentalist. He joined the faculty of the Department of Civil Engineering and the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at UIUC in 1968. His major research interests are in electrohydrodynamics of multiphase systems, aerosol deposition, radioactive aerosols, and removal of radon gas form gas streams, and he has published extensively. He introduced courses related to pollution problems in environmental engineering. As an advisor on environmental issues and public policy, he served on boards and panels ranging from problems of pollution for the cities of Champaign and Urbana to the United States Congress Office of Technology Assessment.

With his appointment as associate dean in the college of Engineering at UIUC in 1984, Stukel’s career in higher education administration was launched. In 1985, he was appointed dean of the Graduate College and vice chancellor for research at the University of Illinois at Chicago and rose to the position of chancellor in 1991. He has been a leader in envisioning an urban mission for UIC in the life of the city of Chicago, a unique identity for a land grant institution. Stukel’s vision is for UIC to reach out to improve the quality of life in metropolitan Chicago n the areas of K-12 education, health care, housing, economic development, and public safety. He is working to improve relations with city and county governments and to make UIC a place government officials can turn for help. The following programs are just four examples of this vision: the UIC Neighborhoods Initiative to establish partnerships with neighborhood organizations to help improve the quality of life in these areas, the Center for Urban Business to promote small business development, the Hypertension Research Venter to develop and apply new and existing therapeutic measures to this problem, and the Nation of Tomorrow program to reach the lives of inner city children, both in and out of classroom. An aggressive program of capital improvements for the UIC campus is part of his plan for a more humane environment. New buildings are under construction, and a program is underway to create a more open, green campus. The reputation of UIC has grown steadily under his leadership.

Stukel has been a loyal alumnus of the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering and the university. He has dedicated his professional talent for more than a quarter of a century to the advancement of the University of Illinois.

Current as of 1994.