Lehigh announced William Gaudelli, who brings leadership experience from Columbia University’s Teachers College, will become the new dean of the College of Education starting July 31.
He will replace Gary Sasso, who will retire at the conclusion of the 2017-2018 academic year.
Gaudelli has worked at Teachers College since 2006 and acted as the chair of the department of arts and humanities since 2014. Before that, he was an associate professor and secondary social studies program coordinator at the University of Central Florida.
His academic focus has been global citizenship education along with teacher development and education. He cofounded the Global Competence Certificate Program, an online, graduate-level certificate program in global competence education for in-service educators.
Lehigh offers an undergraduate Global Citizenship Program which Gaudelli said was another consideration for him in bringing his experience to Lehigh, though he is not yet sure exactly how his relationship with the program will manifest.
The timing of Gaudelli’s hire will position him to be part of the growth Lehigh has planned in its Path to Prominence. One of the facets of the expansion is a greater emphasis on research.
In that context, Gaudelli will have the opportunity to influence members of all areas of campus — including engineering, which has long been Lehigh’s strength.
“The advantages you have with that kind of thinking is that it actually works well with STEAM education,” Gaudelli told The Brown and White. “I think there’s a lot of exciting possibilities related to design thinking and pedagogy.”
In addition to his rise to higher education, Gaudelli has spent time getting close to his subject field by acting as a member of the South Orange-Maplewood Board of Education from 2011 to 2014 and teaching social studies at Hunterdon Central Regional High School for 10 years.
Gaudelli said his high regard for Lehigh came partially from the fact that his high school students who went on to attend Lehigh reported positive things about the university.
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