University of Miami President Julio Frenk, a Mexican-born global health expert, will become the next chancellor of UCLA and the first Latino elected to lead the country's leading public research university, winning unanimous approval on Wednesday of the regents of the University of California, as the campus faces a dark time of divisive protests.
Frenk, 70, will bring to the Westwood campus deep public health experience, a medical degree and experience as Mexico's former health minister, equipping him to oversee its comprehensive network of hospitals and clinics alongside the large company. academic of 46,700 students. Frenk has also proven to be a prodigious fundraiser, leading a $2.5 billion campaign for the University of Miami's centennial next year and quadrupling contributions as dean of Harvard's school of public health, helping to secure a historic endowment. of $350 million.
Frenk will succeed Chancellor Gene Block, who will step down on July 31 after a 17-year tenure that included leading UCLA through a financial crisis and a global pandemic to reach new heights in expanding enrollment, diversity , philanthropy and research funding.
Frenk won't take the reins until January 2025. Darnell Hunt, executive vice chancellor and provost at UCLA, will serve as interim chancellor until then, after Block returns to his faculty position as a researcher of sleep cycles and circadian rhythms.
UC regents unanimously approved the appointment of Frenk, who was recommended by UC President Michael V. Drake. He will earn an annual base salary of $978,904.
“At this pivotal time for higher education, returning to the public sector to lead one of the world's top research universities, including one of the top 10 largest academic health systems, is an exciting opportunity and great honor for me,” Frenk said. in a statement after the vote. “I look forward to adding my lifelong commitment to public service in education and healthcare to the vibrant, diverse and cosmopolitan community that is Los Angeles.”
Julio Frenk, left, will take over as UCLA chancellor in January 2025. Darnell Hunt, right, executive vice chancellor and chancellor at UCLA, will serve as interim chancellor.
(Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times)
Frenk will arrive at UCLA at a particularly tense time, as protests over the war between Israel and Hamas, labor unrest, increasing burdens on faculty and lingering pandemic sadness have rocked the campus. Despite UCLA's top academic ranking and its status as the most applicant university in the nation, many on campus report what they say is unprecedented division, acrimony, exhaustion and unrest. The division was reflected in a close but unsuccessful vote by faculty to censure Block and express their lack of confidence in his leadership to handle the university's response to a pro-Palestinian camp and a mob attack against it.
In several recent interviews with UCLA faculty and students about their hopes for the next chancellor, the dominant issue raised was the need to unify the shattered campus.
“Historically, I don't think we've seen so much division; it's hard to keep the community together,” said Andrea Kasko, president of the UCLA Academic Senate. “The next chancellor will have to rebuild trust with everyone and listen a lot. The community needs to heal.”
Frenk's background may be suitable for that task. As the son of a German-Jewish father who fled Nazi Germany in the 1930s, he has a personal sensitivity to anti-Semitism; He has also praised the power of tolerance, inclusion, generosity and kindness that he says Mexicans offered his displaced family and helped them succeed.
“Universities are more essential than ever, especially as we move into this complex environment with divisive discourse that pits some groups in society against others,” he said in an interview several years ago on Thrive Global. “We have to stand out as a symbol of the use of reason to address our differences in a respectful way, of being able to embrace diversity in all dimensions. But that diversity must be accompanied by the idea that we can tolerate different perspectives, because it also includes diversity of opinion.”
Frenk, however, has not addressed the intense pro-Palestinian protests and counter-protests that have led to violence, aggressive police actions, arrests, and student disciplinary cases at UCLA and other campuses across the country. Students at the University of Miami have not organized a pro-Palestinian camp; A university talk two months ago by survivors of Hamas's Oct. 7 attack on Israel appears to have sparked no protests.
At UCLA, Frenk will also face controversy over policing and security practices. While UCLA leadership has been criticized for failing to achieve enough law enforcement to stop attacks on pro-Palestinian protesters on April 30 and May 1, others are highly critical of the current level of policing.
Carlos Santos, associate professor of social welfare, said the new chancellor must address growing concerns about what some on campus see as excessive use of police force and punishments against peaceful protesters.
And it remains to be seen how well Frenk will transition from a career at smaller private universities (the University of Miami has 18,000 students) to the much larger public UCLA and the 10-campus UC system.
At UC Berkeley, for example, faculty advocated for an internal candidate to replace outgoing Chancellor Carol Christ, given the complexities of the campus, and landed one in business school Dean Rich Lyons, who will take the helm on July 1. Some UCLA professors have raised similar questions about the ability of an outsider to grasp and manage UC's largest campus with no experience in the system.
Shane White and Michael Meranze, former presidents of the UCLA Academic Senate, said faculty numbers have not kept pace with growing student enrollment, leading to increased workloads and burnout. Between 2011 and 2023, UCLA student enrollment increased by 18.8%, but Academic Senate faculty members grew by less than 2%.
Additionally, Kasko said, staffing shortages have burdened professors with more bureaucratic tasks, leading to less time for teaching and research.
The three faculty leaders also said that graduate students need to be better supported with funding or the campus will have to reduce their numbers and risk losing young intellectual talent critical to UC's powerful research enterprise.
“We need more classrooms, professors and graduate students,” White said. “We're supposed to be the think tank for Silicon Valley's next inventors and startups to deliver what society needs.”
James Steintrager, president of the UC systemwide Academic Senate, said Frenk's ability to span the worlds of university research and health care delivery made him an excellent fit for UCLA. “The pool of candidates to lead this important public university was notable, but Dr. Frenk stood out for his unique combination of academic, medical, administrative and political experience,” he said in a statement.
Among students, many say the cost of housing, food, transportation and other financial needs is a constant problem. Adam Tfayli, president of the UCLA student body, said the next chancellor should be more attentive to those needs and be more accessible to students to listen to their concerns, such as campus safety and the growing feelings of alienation that persist due to the pandemic. and remote learning.
“The current climate on campus is at an all-time low,” he said. “People aren't necessarily that connected.”
Frenk addressed those needs at the University of Miami when he took office in 2015. In his inaugural address, he announced two major commitments: creating 100 new positions to attract and retain the best faculty, and increasing support for students to meet the 100% of your demonstrated financial need.
He has also praised student activism. In a column for the University of Miami student newspaper, he praised his students (some of whom graduated from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where a gunman killed 17 people in 2018) for their advocacy. against armed violence. He said his “refusal to remain silent in the face of violence and intimidation” inspired him.
Frenk's greatest professional passion is global health. A fourth-generation physician, he earned his medical degree from the National Autonomous University of Mexico in 1979. He also received a master's degree in public health and sociology and a joint doctorate in health care organization and sociology from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
Frenk was Minister of Health under President Vicente Fox from 2000 to 2006 and is credited with introducing universal health insurance, Seguro Popular, which expanded access to health care for millions of uninsured Mexicans. He expanded access to family planning and contraception, drawing criticism from some conservatives. He also worked as a principal investigator for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's global health program and was director of the World Health Organization in Geneva.
At Harvard, Frenk is credited with balancing the public health school's budget, diversifying research, and helping secure the $350 million endowment, the largest in Harvard history.
Frenk is married to Felicia Knaul, a health economist; The couple has two children. In addition to academic articles, he has written two children's books about the human body and enjoys opera, cycling and football.
“Dr. Frenk has demonstrated a powerful commitment to the health and well-being of people, institutions and systems around the world,” Drake said in a statement. “His leadership will build on the growth and strength that the campus has accomplished under the Chancellor Block and will accelerate UCLA's brilliant trajectory in service to Los Angeles, the nation and the world.”
