John Patrick "Pat" Crecine (August 22, 1939 – April 28, 2008) was an
American
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
educator and economist who served as President of
Georgia Tech
The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part of ...
, Dean at
Carnegie Mellon University, business executive, and professor. After receiving his early education at public schools in
Lansing
Lansing () is the capital of the U.S. state of Michigan. It is mostly in Ingham County, although portions of the city extend west into Eaton County and north into Clinton County. The 2020 census placed the city's population at 112,644, makin ...
,
Michigan
Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...
, he earned a bachelor's degree in
industrial management, and master's and doctoral degrees in industrial administration from the
Graduate School of Industrial Administration
The Tepper School of Business is the business school of Carnegie Mellon University. It is located in the university's campus in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US.
The school offers degrees from the undergraduate through doctoral levels, in addition t ...
(now called
Tepper School of Business
The Tepper School of Business is the business school of Carnegie Mellon University. It is located in the university's campus in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US.
The school offers degrees from the undergraduate through doctoral levels, in addition ...
) at
Carnegie Mellon University. He also spent a year at the
Stanford University School of Business.
Michigan
Dr. Crecine's academic career began at the
University of Michigan
, mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth"
, former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821)
, budget = $10.3 billion (2021)
, endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
, where he established the country's first graduate program in
public policy
Public policy is an institutionalized proposal or a decided set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines, and actions to solve or address relevant and real-world problems, guided by a conception and often implemented by programs. Public p ...
in 1968 as the first Director of the Institute of Public Policy Studies, IPPS, (now the
Gerald Ford School of Public Policy), while also holding academic appointments in
political science
Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
and
sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of empirical investigation an ...
. While at Michigan, Crecine established a joint Law and Public Policy program with the Michigan Law School and joint Ph.D. programs with Economics, Political Science, Sociology, Urban and Regional Planning, and Industrial Engineering, each of which were represented in the core curriculum of the IPPS Masters Program.
While at Michigan, he interrupted his teaching several times to serve the federal government as an economist, statistician, and consultant, and to work as an economist with the
RAND Corporation. He earned tenure in 1968 and full professorships in Political Science and Sociology in 1970.
Carnegie Mellon
In 1976, he became dean Carnegie Mellon's
Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences
The Marianna Brown Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences (Dietrich College) is the liberal and professional studies college and the second-largest academic unit by enrollment (after the Carnegie Mellon College of Engineering) at Ca ...
and Professor of Political Economy in the Department of Social and Decision Sciences and in the School of Urban and Public Affairs (now
Heinz College
The Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy, often called Heinz College, at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is a private graduate college that consists of one of the nation's top-ranked public policy schools— ...
). As Dean he conceived of and implemented a core curriculum, described by the Education Editor of the New York Times as "the most innovative in America," and added departments of Statistics,
Social and Decision Sciences
The Department of Social and Decision Sciences (SDS) is an interdisciplinary academic department within the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University. The Department of Social and Decision Sciences is headqu ...
, Philosophy, and several research centers in the cognitive sciences, design, and computational linguistics to the College. Following a year as
Visiting Fellow Commoner at the
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...
, he was appointed Senior Vice President and Provost in 1983, with administrative responsibility for Carnegie Mellon's academic, research, and systems development in computing
Andrew Project
The Andrew Project was a distributed computing environment developed at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) beginning in 1982. It was an ambitious project for its time and resulted in an unprecedentedly vast and accessible university computing infras ...
and computer science and initiated, with Prof.
Raj Reddy
Dabbala Rajagopal "Raj" Reddy (born 13 June 1937) is an Indian-American computer scientist and a winner of the Turing Award. He is one of the early pioneers of artificial intelligence and has served on the faculty of Stanford and Carnegie Mello ...
, the formation of the
Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science
The School of Computer Science (SCS) at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US is a school for computer science established in 1988. It has been consistently ranked among the top computer science programs over the decades. ...
(which became the first such college in the country). He was also the founding chief executive officer of the
Inter-university Consortium for Educational Computing, an association of research universities. In 1986, he was the first chief administrative officer and oversaw the founding of the
University Athletic Association
The University Athletic Association (UAA) is an American athletic conference that competes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) Division III. Member schools are highly selective universities located in Georgia, Illinois, M ...
, an
NCAA
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
Division III
In sport, the Third Division, also called Division 3, Division Three, or Division III, is often the third-highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below.
Association football
*Belgian Thir ...
Conference.
Crecine returned to Carnegie Mellon in the fall of 2006 as Distinguished Service Professor at the
Heinz College
The Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy, often called Heinz College, at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is a private graduate college that consists of one of the nation's top-ranked public policy schools— ...
.
Georgia Tech
In 1987, Dr. Crecine became the ninth president of the
Georgia Institute of Technology. In addition to his administrative responsibilities, Dr. Crecine held a joint appointment as tenured professor in the new School of International Affairs, and the School of Industrial and Systems Engineering. During his tenure, he initiated the establishment of three new colleges at Tech: the
College of Computing (the first such college in the country); the Ivan Allen College of Management, Policy, and International Affairs; and the
College of Sciences. He also served as Chairman of the
Georgia Tech Athletic Association The Georgia Tech Athletic Association is a non-profit organization responsible for maintaining the intercollegiate athletic program at Georgia Tech. The Athletic Association is overseen by the Georgia Tech Athletic Board. The Georgia Tech Athletic A ...
and as President of the
Georgia Tech Research Corporation. During his tenure as President, the
College of Engineering
Engineering education is the activity of teaching knowledge and principles to the professional practice of engineering. It includes an initial education ( bachelor's and/or master's degree), and any advanced education and specializations tha ...
's ranking climbed from 14th to 9th in the country, the institution was transformed from a specialized institution to a top-30 national university,
SAT
The SAT ( ) is a standardized test widely used for college admissions in the United States. Since its debut in 1926, its name and scoring have changed several times; originally called the Scholastic Aptitude Test, it was later called the Schol ...
scores of Fall entering freshmen for 1992, 1993, and 1994 rose to become the highest of any public research university in the U.S., graduation rates increased by nearly 12 percent, student facilities and housing (including those under construction) were doubled from those of the previous 102 years of the institution’s existence, and sponsored research awards more than doubled.
Athletics
During Crecine's tenure and under Athletic Director
Homer Rice
Homer C. Rice (born February 20, 1927) is a former American football player, coach, and college athletics administrator. As Director of Athletics at Georgia Tech, Rice successfully developed and implemented the Total Person Program which is now ...
's leadership, Georgia Tech’s intercollegiate athletic programs thrived with the football team winning the NCAA national championship in 1990, the basketball team going to the NCAA "
Final Four" in 1990 along with several ACC championships, and the baseball team going to the 1994 College World Series. During Dr. Crecine's tenure, Georgia Tech student-athletes had roughly the same graduation rates as other Georgia Tech students.
Olympics
In November 1987, Dr. Crecine, acting on behalf of Georgia Tech, volunteered to help Atlanta become the host city for the
1996 Centennial Olympic Games and was an active member of the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games before and after Atlanta was chosen as host for the Centennial Games (from 1988 to 1996). Dr. Crecine conceived of and arranged funding for the development of a computerized, virtual reality model of the competition, living, and support facilities to be constructed in support of the Centennial Games as part of Atlanta’s bid package. Georgia Tech was the
Olympic Village
An Olympic Village is an accommodation center built for the Olympic Games, usually within an Olympic Park or elsewhere in a host city. Olympic Villages are built to house all participating athletes, as well as officials and athletic trainers. Afte ...
during the Centennial Games. As a result, both on-campus housing and student athletic and recreational facilities more than doubled. Georgia Tech hosted the boxing, swimming, diving, synchronized swimming, and water polo competitions.
Reorganization
In 1988, Crecine proposed a controversial restructuring of the university. The Institute at that point had four colleges: the
College of Engineering
Engineering education is the activity of teaching knowledge and principles to the professional practice of engineering. It includes an initial education ( bachelor's and/or master's degree), and any advanced education and specializations tha ...
, the
College of Management, the College of Architecture, and the catch-all COSALS, the College of Sciences and Liberal Studies. Crecine proposed the reorganization of the latter two into the
College of Computing, the
College of Sciences, and the Ivan Allen College of Management, Policy, and International Affairs.
A significant feature of the proposed reorganization was, in addition to creating degree programs in international affairs and public policy, was allowing faculty in the social sciences and humanities to develop degree programs in addition to traditional service courses and to add programs in the fine and performing arts to the College of Architecture and Design's programs. The proposals generally represented an action plan for creating a "technological university for the 21st Century" and an elaboration of Crecine's April, 1988 Inaugural Address. Although the Institute historian, August Geibelhaus states that "Crecine announced the changes without asking for input, and consequently many faculty members disliked him for his top-down management style",
Crecine asked the Faculty Senate in August 1988 to appoint and form committees for each of the three proposed new colleges to comment on the advisability of the proposed reorganization and to suggest improvements in the proposals. Although the Faculty Senate initially resisted the formation of the three committees, they were all formed and chaired by faculty not part of the administration and supported the proposals with modest changes. In June 1989, the administration sent out ballots, and the proposed changes passed, with a slim margin among the academic faculty (52%-48%) and with a wider margin among the research faculty (75%-25%). The proposed reorganization was approved unanimously by the Board of Regents of the State University System of Georgia. The restructuring took effect in January 1990. While Crecine was seen in a poor light by many of the faculty at the time, the changes he made are considered visionary.
Post-academic career
Dr. Crecine’s resignation as President of Georgia Tech took effect in July 1994. Dr. Crecine was associated with several start-up companies involved in Information Technology, ecommerce, and the internet and at the time of his death was CEO of
B.P.T., Inc. a consulting firm. He served as a member of the Board of Directors of several public companies:
Intermet Corporation (1993–2005),
Web.com
Web.com Group Inc. was an American company headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida that provides domain name registration and web development services. Established in 1999 by Darin Brannan, the company was known as Website Pros Inc. until early ...
(formerly Interland Corporation, 2003–present),
Liebert Corporation (1982–1987), 796 (Pittsburgh Baseball Club Ownership Group, 1982–87),
NeXT Computers, Inc. (1987–1990),
HBOC, Inc. (1992–1998),
Total eMed (1999–2000), and numerous non-profit and charitable organizations.
Georgia Research Alliance - Board of Trustees
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Crecine, John Patrick
1939 births
2008 deaths
Presidents of Georgia Tech
Tepper School of Business alumni
Carnegie Mellon University faculty
University of Michigan faculty