Michael S. Levine to serve as interim vice chancellor for academic personnel

May 19, 2016

The University of California regents recently approved the appointment of professor Michael Stephen Levine as interim vice chancellor for academic personnel at UCLA, effective July 1, according to an announcement by UCLA Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Scott Waugh.

Professor Carole Goldberg announced earlier that she will step down as vice chancellor and return to her faculty appointment in the UCLA School of Law.

A member of the UCLA faculty since 1976, Levine is a distinguished professor in the department of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences in the David Geffen School of Medicine. He holds the Gail Patrick Endowed Chair in Brain Research and is the associate director for education of the Brain Research Institute.

Levine serves as the department’s associate chair for academic affairs. He is currently the special assistant to the vice chancellor for academic personnel and has held several leadership positions in the Undergraduate Interdepartmental Program in Neuroscience, the Interdepartmental Ph.D. Program in Neuroscience and the Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center. He also served on the UCLA Academic Senate's Council on Academic Personnel (CAP) and was the council’s vice chair from 2005 to 2006.

In his role as special assistant to the vice chancellor, he analyzes and evaluates personnel cases after they have been considered by the CAP, supplies guidance for cases that have encountered procedural difficulties and advises faculty members who are seeking merit equity reviews. He also reviews conflict of commitment reports, provides input on academic personnel policy changes and serves on or chairs task forces associated with new initiatives in academic personnel.

Levine's research focuses on the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative disorders. His multidisciplinary work carries implications for such disorders as Huntington’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and pediatric epilepsy.

He has published approximately 250 peer-reviewed research reports as well as more than 30 book chapters, and he has received research support from a variety of agencies within the National Institutes of Health, as well as from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, the Office of Naval Research and numerous foundations. Among many other honors and awards, he is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and was a recipient of the National Association for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression’s Distinguished Investigator Award in 1999.

It's anticipated that a search committee will be formed to identify candidates for a permanent vice chancellor during the 2016–17 academic year.