Computer science professor
appointed to rank of Distinguished Professor

The State University of New York Board of Trustees have appointed Dr. Keqin Li, professor in the Department of Computer Science at the State University of New York at New Paltz, to the position of Distinguished Professor, the State University’s highest faculty designation.

The Distinguished Professor designation is conferred on individuals who have achieved national or international prominence in a chosen field. Li, who joined the faculty at New Paltz as assistant professor in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science in 1990, is an internationally recognized expert for his prolific research and exemplary scholarship in the development of parallel and distributed computing theory – the means by which computational resources are optimized.

“The standard of excellence to which professor Li adheres, and his unwavering dedication to advancing knowledge have brought Keqin international prominence and inspired colleagues and students at home and abroad,” said College President, Steven Poskanzer. “In every other aspect Keqin has been a treasured member of our academic community, who has made it a point to conduct research with students even as he pursues a world-class scholarly agenda.”

Among Li’s notable awards and grants, he has received several National Science Foundation grants, including one for $292,347 in 2001; and he served as a faculty research fellow at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, in 1996, supported by a joint NASA/American Society for Engineering Education Summer Faculty Fellowship Program grant.

Li has authored more than 200 widely cited books, chapters, journal articles and refereed conference papers. Li’s papers have won several best paper awards in highly competitive international conferences. He has been invited to contribute chapters for 11 books, including “Handbook of Parallel Computing.” Li has also chaired a number of leading conferences in computer science, including the International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium, an international forum for engineers and scientists from around the world to present their latest research findings in all aspects of parallel computation.

The SUNY Board of Trustees noted Dr. Li as being known for wide research interests and has been recognized as “one of the leading international researchers over many years in the areas of embedding, task allocation, performance evaluation, parallel algorithms, optical and wireless networks.”

Li joined the faculty at New Paltz in 1990 as an assistant professor in what was then the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science. In 1996 he was promoted to associate professor and three years later to full professor. From January 2004 until January 2009 he served as chair of the Department of Computer Science.

Previously, Li was an instructor and research assistant in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Houston in Texas (1987-1990).

Dr. Li earned his Ph. D. in Computer Science in 1990 at the University of Houston and his Bachelor of Science in Computer Science in 1985 from Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.