Robert Sloan steps down as CS department head

Robert Sloan, professor and longtime department head of computer science, stepped down from his leadership position on August 15. Since 2007, Sloan has overseen exceptional growth in the department’s research program, student enrollment, and commitment to expanding opportunities for UIC students.

Sloan came to UIC in 1990 as an assistant professor of computer science in what was then a combined electrical engineering and computer science department. He earned his PhD in computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University.

Sloan has long held an interest in administrative leadership. He served as the department’s director of undergraduate studies from 1998 to 2000, and director of graduate studies from 2004 to 2007. In 2001, Sloan accepted a 20-month appointment to the National Science Foundation as a program director for theory of computing projects.

Sloan has led the department for almost 20 years, accepting the role of acting department head in 2007, followed by a year as interim head before being named department head in 2009.

Two decades of change and growth

The department has changed radically during Sloan’s tenure. When he took over, the department needed to grow its pool of 242 undergraduate majors and under 200 graduate students or risk shrinking its 27-person faculty. Today, the department has about 2,700 students, including over 2,100 undergraduates, served by over 80 faculty members.

“I foresaw good things happening for computer science, but I didn’t imagine the explosion in numbers,” Sloan said. “The department head position changed from an expected commitment of 40% to 50% of my time to nearly a full-time position.”

Today, the department has an operating budget of over $13 million, with $11.5 million in annual research expenditures. While Sloan is extremely proud of the quality and size of the faculty research, he is equally proud of the level of education provided to students, especially undergraduates.

“It’s incredible how well sought after our students are, and it’s quite clear that delivering on the top-quality undergraduate program is an even higher value today than it was in 2007,” Sloan said.

Another point of pride for Sloan is the increase in enrollment of both Hispanic students and women and non-binary students in computer science. Sloan was a leader in these efforts. In his early years as department head, he found funds to send some students and faculty to the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, when it was still a small, little-known conference. Later, he brought the department into the BRAID (Building, Recruiting, and Inclusion for Diversity) initiative, the Computing Alliance for Hispanic Serving Institutions, and has been the PI and academic lead for Break Through Tech Chicago, a gender diversity in tech grant that was one of the largest grants ever received by the College of Engineering.   Today, the CS department has strong enrollment of both Hispanic and female and nonbinary students. Once accounting for just 10% to 12% of total CS enrollment, the department now has about 26% female and non-binary students. Sloan hopes to see these numbers continue to increase.

As part of his broader vision for a well-rounded, socially responsible computer science education, Sloan also prioritized ethics instruction for students. Sloan hired the first full-time ethics instructor, Senior Lecturer Emanuelle Burton. Burton earned her PhD in religion and literature from the University of Chicago Divinity School, then completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the computer science department at the University of Kentucky. The ethics class was long required for computer science majors but became much more popular with students and more valued by faculty after Burton’s hiring. The course is timelier than ever, with the rise of AI and machine learning algorithms, reminding students of the power and responsibility they hold for shaping technology that touches everyone’s lives.

Two additional majors have been added to the department in recent years, including Data Science and Computer Science + Design. A third major, CS and Linguistics, is offered in collaboration with the College of Engineering, and is housed in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

The July opening of the long-awaited Computer Design Research and Learning Center is a crowning achievement of Sloan’s long tenure as department head. The state-of-the-art facility more than doubles the previous capacity of the department, which saw faculty spread across a half-dozen campus buildings.

“Pete Nelson and I were pressing for this building for a long time, and I am thankful that Governor J.B. Pritzker and the Illinois Legislature, which appropriated $98 million for the project, saw the value and promise our department holds,” Sloan said. “We also had strong support from the University of Illinois Board of Trustees and many generous donors.”

Outside of his leadership role

Despite the demands of the role, Sloan has maintained a full research program. His current work is focused on legal and public policy issues as they connect to computer security and electronic privacy. While department head, he authored four books, including three on privacy, and countless papers.

Sloan has been dedicated to his teaching and curriculum development. He received a 2005 UIC Teaching Recognition Award and the UIC Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2006. He was named a University of Illinois Scholar in 2019. The IEEE Computer Society also honored Sloan with an Outstanding Contribution Award for “the establishment of computing curricula for computer engineering” in 2006, and the society’s Golden Core Recognition for long standing service to the society.

Sloan also started a scholarship for the top student in the UIC-Politecnico di Milano program, an international program that brings students from top Italian technical schools to earn their master’s degree at UIC. Through the scholarship, the top student from the program can remain at UIC to pursue their doctoral degree.

What’s next

Sloan will continue his research and teaching at UIC but will take a break from teaching for the 2025-2026 academic year, spending it at Politecnico di Milano. The department wishes Sloan the best as he enters the next stage of his career.