Announcing New ORU Directors
The Office of Research is pleased to announce new leadership in two of our campus Organized Research Units. Dr. Dolores Inés Casillas, Associate Professor of Chicana and Chicano Studies, has been appointed Director of the Chicano Studies Institute, and Dr. Gretchen Hofmann, Professor of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology, has been appointed Interim Director of the Marine Science Institute.
Dolores Inés Casillas is an Associate Professor in the Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). She is also affiliated faculty with Film & Media Studies, Center for Information Technology and Society (CITS), Latin American Studies, and Applied Linguistics. Her research focuses on immigrant engagement with U.S. Spanish-language and bilingual media.
Gretchen Hofmann is a Professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology at UC Santa Barbara. As a marine biologist, her research focuses on the responses of marine species to future ocean change such as ocean acidification and ocean warming. Working in places as diverse as the coastal oceans of California and Antarctica, Prof. Hofmann and her lab group are trying to understand whether and how marine species can adapt to environmental change in the ocean.
Both have extensive experience leading interdisciplinary research programs, in addition to deep engagement with undergraduate research and broadening participation in higher education and STEM. Their appointments signal the continuation of investment in UCSB’s innovative areas of research excellence, catalyzed through our organized research units and associated research centers.
