Professor Antonio Merlo, our former faculty member from 2000-2014, has been named as the 16th President of Drexel University. Dr. Merlo received his PhD in economics from New York University.
Dr. Merlo is a brilliant scholar, especially well known for his research in political economy. At Penn, he was the Lawrence R. Klein Professor of Economics, the chair of the Economics Department, Director of the Penn Institute for Economic Research, a research associate in the Population Studies Center and a member of the advisory board of Penn’s Center for Italian Studies. Dr. Merlo was also a distinguished teacher and won numerous awards for his teaching while at Penn. He was also the coach of the water polo club, being an expert player himself.
He left Penn in 2014 to become Chair of the economics department at Rice University, where they quickly realized his high potential in administration and appointed him as Dean of Arts and Sciences for five years. After that, he became Dean of Arts and Sciences at NYU.
We congratulate Dr. Antonio Merlo on his latest great accomplishment and are very happy to have him back in Philadelphia again.