About the President

Reginald DesRoches is Rice University’s eighth president. He also serves as a professor of civil and environmental engineering, and professor of mechanical engineering. As president, DesRoches is the chief executive officer of the university and its 8,800 plus students, eight schools and more than 900 faculty. He previously served as Rice's Howard Hughes Provost and William and Stephanie Sick Dean of Engineering.

During his time as president, DesRoches has launched a period of strategic growth at Rice, increasing the number of undergraduate and graduate students by 20% while maintaining the university’s low student-to-faculty ratio and deep commitment to excellence and access. Under his leadership, DesRoches has overseen the hiring of a record number of faculty, established new majors, increased the university’s research awards, launched several new centers and institutes and forged new partnerships and programs in the Houston area, including the Texas Medical Center. He is a proponent of the international role of education and research and has launched Rice Global India in Bengaluru to increase collaboration between Rice and one of India’s rapidly growing high-tech cities. DesRoches also has helped grow and strengthen Rice’s presence in Europe and Latin America.

During his tenure as provost, DesRoches led the university’s academic, research, scholarly and creative activities through the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, including the sudden suspension of classroom instruction and Rice’s successful conversion to remote learning. Under his leadership, several new majors and professional master’s programs were launched, including a new undergraduate business major. Several new online programs were created during his time as provost as well, including the online degrees in the Jones Graduate School of Business and several online master’s degrees in the School of Engineering. He also began leading the first major expansion of the undergraduate body in over a decade while also remaining committed to access and excellence.

Before his appointment at Rice, DesRoches served as chair of the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Georgia Tech in Atlanta. As chair, he led a major renovation of the school’s main research and teaching home, and he spearheaded a major fundraising effort for the school that doubled the number of endowed chairs and professors. During his tenure as chair, the school moved up in the U.S News & World Report graduate rankings, achieving a ranking of No. 2 in the nation — the highest in the history of the school.

DesRoches’ primary research interests are in the design of resilient infrastructure systems under extreme loads and the application of smart materials. His work includes the first comprehensive study on seismic vulnerability for the most common types of bridges in the Central and Southeastern United States, which resulted in changes in practice for the design and construction of bridges. His work also provides the first set of vulnerability models for a range of bridge types and retrofit measures and provides decision-makers with essential tools for maximizing investment in bridge retrofit.

A fellow of the Structural Engineering Institute, DesRoches served as a key technical leader in the United States’ response to the 2010 Haiti earthquake, taking a team of 28 engineers, architects, city planners and social scientists to study the impact of the earthquake. He also has participated in numerous congressional briefings to underscore the critical role that university research must play in addressing the country’s failing infrastructure and enhancing the nation’s resilience to natural hazards.

A member of the National Academy of Engineering, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Philosophical Society of Texas, DesRoches’ distinctive research record has been recognized for its impact and innovation. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is a Distinguished Member of the American Society of Civil Engineers. DesRoches received the Distinguished Arnold Kerr Lecturer Award in 2019, the John A. Blume Distinguished Lecturer Award in 2018, and the 2018 Earthquake Engineering Research Institute Distinguished Lecturer Award, one of the highest honors in the field of earthquake engineering. He also is a recipient of the 2015 ASCE Charles Martin Duke Lifeline Earthquake Engineering award, the 2007 ASCE Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize, and the Georgia Tech ANAK Award, which is the highest honor the Georgia Tech student body can bestow on a faculty member. DesRoches is a member of the Academy of Distinguished Alumni in Civil Engineering at Berkeley and was recently named an honorary alumnus of Georgia Tech.

In 2014, DesRoches became Georgia Tech’s Faculty Athletics Representative, serving as the liaison between the university and its athletics department. He worked closely with the athletic director and university leadership — including the president, provost and senior vice provost for academic affairs — to formulate policies affecting intercollegiate athletics on campus. His responsibilities also included representing the institute to the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) and the National Collegiate Athletic Association. During the 2016-2017 school year, he was appointed to the ACC leadership team as vice president of the conference.

DesRoches was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and grew up in Queens, New York. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, a Master of Science in Civil Engineering and a Doctorate in Structural Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley.

DesRoches is married to Paula DesRoches, a highly accomplished healthcare professional, nurse practitioner and administrator recognized for her leadership in occupational health. The couple has three children, Andrew, Jacob and Shelby, who graduated from Rice in 2023.