Michael Crow

Michael M. Crow is an educator, knowledge enterprise architect, science and technology policy scholar and higher education leader. He became the 16th president of Arizona State University in July 2002 and has spearheaded ASU’s rapid and groundbreaking transformative evolution into one of America’s best public metropolitan research universities. As a model “New American University,” ASU simultaneously demonstrates comprehensive excellence, inclusivity representative of the ethnic and socioeconomic diversity of the United States, and consequential societal impact.



Lauded as the ”#1 most innovative” school in the nation by U.S. News & World Report, ASU is a student-centric, technology-enabled knowledge enterprise focused on complex global challenges related to sustainability, economic competitiveness, social embeddedness, entrepreneurship and global engagement. Under Crow’s leadership, ASU has established 25 new transdisciplinary schools, including the School of Earth and Space Exploration, the School for the Future of Innovation in Society and the School of Human Evolution and Social Change, and launched trailblazing multidisciplinary initiatives including the Biodesign Institute, 16 use-inspired research centers focused on biomedicine and health, sustainability and security; the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability and the nation’s first School of Sustainability, which advance research, education and business practices at the intersection of nature and the made environment.



Crow’s model has achieved record-breaking levels of traditional, online and international student enrollment, freshman quality and retention, and nearly five-fold growth in research expenditures. ASU’s meteoric ascent in quality, growth and modernization has earned it separate rankings as one of the top 100 most prestigious universities in the world by Times Higher Education, and a top 100 position in Shanghai Jiao Tong’s 2018 Academic Ranking of World Universities.



The inaugural recipient of the American Council on Education Award for Institutional Transformation, and one of TIME magazine’s “10 Best College Presidents,” Crow previously served as executive vice provost and professor of science and technology policy at Columbia University. He has advised the U.S. Departments of State, Commerce, and Energy, as well as defense and intelligence agencies, and serves as Chairman of In-Q-Tel. He is a former member of the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and has advised several nation-states on matters of knowledge enterprise development. An elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and National Academy of Public Administration, university vice chairman of the U.S. Council on Competitiveness, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, he is the author of books and articles analyzing knowledge enterprises, science and technology policy, and the design of higher education institutions and systems. He coauthored "Designing the New American University" (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015), outlining the imperative for new and creative public university models that advance concurrent academic excellence and broad accessibility. Crow earned his doctorate in public administration (science and technology policy) from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University.