Gunnar Knapp, Ph.D. to retire as Director of UAA’s Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER)

Dr. Gunnar Knapp will retire from his post as ISER director effective June 30, 2016.

Dr. Knapp will remain actively involved with ISER part-time, continuing to lead ISER's research and public engagement on the fiscal challenges facing Alaska, as well as his decades-long research on Alaska's seafood industry.

ISER will begin a search across Alaska and the nation for the next director very soon. ISER's next director will continue its 50-plus year tradition of providing objective, non-partisan research to support informed policy discussions of the complex challenges facing Alaska including those in the areas of education, healthcare and economic development. In recent years, ISER has successfully recruited talented young scholars to maintain and build ISER's capacity to provide the research necessary for Alaskans to understand Alaska-its government, its economy and its future. UAA is fortunate that many of the institute's retired members remain engaged at ISER with the next generation of scholars so both historical and new perspectives are appreciated and accounted for in its work.

"ISER has never been more important to Alaska than now," said College of Business and Public Policy Dean Rashmi Prasad. "Our search for the next ISER director will be comprehensive. My sincere thanks to Gunnar, as well as to those who preceded him as director, for having established a tradition of excellence that can attract the highest caliber of academic talent."

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