WELLESLEY, Mass., Jan. 27, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Academic, innovator, and change agent Dr. Ian Lapp has been named Dean of the Undergraduate School at Babson College. Lapp comes to Babson from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, where he served as associate dean for strategic educational initiatives and lecturer on global health.

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"We are pleased to welcome Dr. Ian Lapp as Dean of the Undergraduate School at Babson College," said Babson President Kerry Healey. "Dean Lapp has earned a well-deserved national and international reputation as an innovator and change agent for his work at Harvard and Columbia University. We look forward to working with him to bring Babson to new heights as a global leader in undergraduate education."

"I have deeply admired Babson College for many years, as a national and global institution with a truly serious commitment to an incredible undergraduate experience. Babson is an incubator for innovation in higher education, and I am excited to join this tradition of excellence," said Dean Lapp. He also looks forward to working with students, faculty, staff, and alumni as the College marks its centennial in 2019 and begins its second century.

Lapp believes strongly in immersing himself in the student community at Babson, from engaging in classroom discussions to sharing meals with undergraduates in the dining hall, to supporting students in their co-curricular and extra-curricular activities on evenings and weekends. "Students bring an essential voice to conversations about the future of higher education, and I am excited to be part of this transformational education experience," said Lapp. He will officially join Babson in April 2016.

About Dean Ian Lapp

Dean Ian Lapp is an internationally recognized entrepreneurial leader in public health education, known for transforming curriculum, pedagogy, and the overall student experience at the undergraduate and graduate level. He has been at Harvard University for the last five years, and previously served at Columbia University for 10 years.

Dr. Lapp was recruited to Harvard from Columbia to lead the school of public health's multi-year educational strategic planning process known as the "Roadmap to 2013," a school-wide effort to mark its centennial in fall 2013, which included the introduction of four new or redesigned degrees. Dr. Lapp has also led the school of public health's innovation efforts in technology and interactive learning including HarvardX, e-learning, and simulations.

At the University level, he served as the inaugural co-chair of Harvard's Teaching and Learning Consortium. At the national level, he has chaired a number of major committees for the Association of Schools & Programs of Public Health (ASPPH) and was a member of the landmark, Framing the Future Taskforce. Dr. Lapp is the president of the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH), which oversees institutional accreditation in public health, and is a member of the board of directors for the National Board of Public Health Examiners (NBPHE), which oversees the certification process of professionals in public health. In the international arena, he has worked extensively with public health programs in Africa, Asia, and Europe including playing a key role in the launch of the James P. Grant School of Public Health in Bangladesh.

Dr. Lapp previously served as associate dean for academic affairs and education at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, where he capped off a 10 year career by co-leading the redesign of the school's MPH degree, the nation's largest professional master's degree program in public health. During his tenure at Columbia, he played a collaborative leadership role in the redesign of dozens of courses, including the core courses, development of a number of degree concentrations including global health, launching of an undergraduate program in public health, designing of e-learning projects and high-tech classrooms, and development of an extensive faculty development program in teaching.

Dr. Lapp received a BS degree in sociology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He earned both a MA and PhD in sociology at the Syracuse University Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. He also earned a MA in television, radio, and film at the Syracuse University Newhouse School of Communications.

About Babson College

Babson College is the educator, convener, and thought leader for Entrepreneurship of All Kinds(®). The top-ranked college for entrepreneurship education, Babson is a dynamic living and learning laboratory where students, faculty, and staff work together to address the real-world problems of business and society. We prepare the entrepreneurial leaders our world needs most: those with strong functional knowledge and the skills and vision to navigate change, accommodate ambiguity, surmount complexity, and motivate teams in a common purpose to make a difference in the world, and have an impact on organizations of all sizes and types. As we have for nearly a half-century, Babson continues to advance Entrepreneurial Thought and Action(®) as the most positive force on the planet for generating sustainable economic and social value.

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SOURCE Babson College