Pekka Sinervo, U of T’s dean of Arts & Science, has announced he is leaving the university next June, a year before his term as dean expires.
The U of T graduate, who joined the faculty as a plucky assistant professor of physics in 1990, rose quickly through the ranks, making full professor in 1995.
When Carl Amrhein vacated the dean’s chair in 2003, U of T’s then-president Robert Birgeneau quickly appointed Sinervo, by then vice-dean of Arts & Science and no longer wet behind the ears, to the faculty’s top job until the university could choose a more permanent replacement. Five months later, U of T picked Sinervo as that replacement. His term began in January 2004, and was to last until June 2009.
During his term as dean, Sinervo test-drove a new set of duties as the university’s first vice-provost of first-entry programs. The post, created last year as part of U of T’s program to improve the student experience, saw Sinervo speaking for Arts & Science, U of T at Mississauga, U of T at Scarborough, Applied Science and Engineering, Music and Physical Education and Health.
Sinervo will instead depart early for Geneva, Switzerland, to pursue his research at the Large Hadron Collider apparatus.
