Michael Hardman is a University Distinguished Professor, Special Assistant to the Office for Global Engagement (OGE), Dean Emeritus, College of Education, and President/ Co-Chair of the University of Utah Asia Campus Board of Directors. He is the former University Chief Global Officer (2013-2018), Interim Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs (2012-2013), Dean of the College of Education (2007-2012), as well as Chair of the Department of Special Education, Chair of the Department of Teaching and Learning, and College Associate Dean for Research. Dr. Hardman has numerous experiences within education and public policy, including appointment as the Matthew J. Guglielmo Endowed Chair at California State University, Los Angeles; Visiting Senior Scholar at Cambridge University; Senior Education Advisor and Kennedy Fellow, the Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. Foundation; Legislative Staff to the United States Senate; the Governor’s Representative to the California Advisory Commission on Special Education, University Coordinator for the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Center for Community of Caring; President of the Higher Education Consortium for Special Education; and a member of the Board of Directors for several international organizations. He has directed or consulted on several international projects on school improvement for USAID, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and UNICEF. Dr. Hardman has published widely in international and national journals in the field of education and has authored nine college textbooks of which two, Human Exceptionality (Cengage Learning) and Intellectual Disabilities Through the Lifespan (Pearson Group), are in their twelfth and ninth editions respectively. As a researcher, he has directed international and national demonstration projects in the areas of educational policy and reform, teacher quality and professional development, inclusive education, and preparing tomorrow’s leaders in education. Michael Hardman is married to Monica Ferguson, National Board Certified Language Specialist, Research Associate in the Urban Institute for Teacher Education at the University of Utah, Co-Founder and Former Director of the Stegner Writing Institute. Mike and Monica live in Park City, Utah, and enjoy hiking, skiing, and tennis. Together they are the parents of five children and have 12 grandchildren.

Dr. Chris M. Ireland joined the faculty of the University of Utah as an Assistant Professor of Medicinal Chemistry in 1983. He served as Professor and Chair of the Department of Medicinal Chemistry from 1992-99 and as Dean of the College of Pharmacy and L. S. Skaggs Presidential Endowed Chair for Pharmacy from 2009 to 2014. In 2015, Dr. Ireland was appointed the Chief Administrative Officer of the University of Utah Asia Campus and Associate Vice President for Research at the Asia Campus. While living in Korea for three years he oversaw tremendous growth in the campus and was also active in revitalizing the University of Utah Korean Alumni Association that has more than 2000 members. He served in these roles at the Asia Campus until his current appointment as the Interim Chief Global Officer of the University of Utah in July 2018. Dr. Ireland will retain his appointments as a Distinguished Professor of Medicinal Chemistry and Adjunct Professor of Chemistry. During his 35 years on the faculty he has established himself as a world leader in the field of natural product drug discovery. Dr. Ireland's research program has focused on the discovery of antitumor agents from natural product sources including marine invertebrate animals, tropical plants and fungi. He and his co-workers have published approximately 200 peer reviewed research articles, eight book chapters and eight patents and received more than $25M in extramural research funding. He has trained more than 60 graduate students and postdoctoral fellows in his lab, many of which have gone on to very successful research careers of their own. It is notable that approximately half of his co-workers have pursued academic careers and include among their ranks a sitting Dean of a US College of Pharmacy, a Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry at a major US University and a variety of other leadership roles at Universities around the world. His research accomplishments and international reputation have been acknowledged in the form of numerous invitations to speak at national and international symposia on natural products research and cancer chemotherapeutics. Dr. Ireland has received additional recognition by serving on a number of review panels at NIH including the Bioorganic and Natural Products NIH study section and most recently as a member of the National Cancer Institute’s Board of Scientific Counselors. He is an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow, an American Society of Pharmacognosy Fellow, a 2008 short term Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, and an Honorary Research Fellow of the Queensland Museum Biodiversity Program. His awards include an NIH Career Development Award, the 2006 University of Utah Inaugural Distinguished Graduate Mentor Award, the 2006 University of Utah, College of Pharmacy Distinguished Teaching Award, the 2007 University of Utah Distinguished Scholarly & Creative Research Award, the 10th Webster Sibilsky Award for Contributions to the Field of Medicinal Chemistry, the 2007 Utah Governor’s Medal for Science and Technology, the 2010 Taito O. Soine Award, the 2012 ASP Farnsworth Award, the 2014 Robert F. Borne Distinguished Lecture Award, the 2014 Richard Hutchinson Award Lecture, and the 2014 Paul J. Scheuer award, the most prestigious award in the field of marine natural products. Dr. Ireland has served as the Principal Investigator of a National Cooperative Drug Discovery Group consortium funded by the NCI to discover new cancer drugs from unique natural products sources, and as the Co-PI of an International Cooperative Biodiversity Group consortium funded by the Fogerty International Center to discover new HIV, Malaria and TB drugs from plants and traditional medicines in Papua New Guinea. During his career, Dr. Ireland has been actively engaged in international research and education programs that have supported student exchanges and development of infrastructure for education and teaching at the University of the Philippines, The University of the South Pacific in Fiji, and the University of Papua New Guinea. Dr. Ireland and his wife Mary Kay Harper, who is a research scientist at the U, have four children and eight grandchildren. Three of their children attended the U. Dr. Ireland and Mary Kay have traveled extensively throughout the tropical Pacific Ocean and Southeast Asia. Their passion is scuba diving and underwater photography.