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Professor Rajesh
Chandra is Deputy Vice-Chancellor at the University of the South
Pacific, a position that he has held since 1997. He has worked at
the University of the South Pacific for 27 years, occupying
various positions, including those of Head of the School of Social
and Economic Development, Professor of Geography, Director of
Planning and Development and Pro Vice-Chancellor (Academic). Since
1990, Professor Chandra has also acted as Vice-Chancellor on
numerous occasions.
At
USP, Professor Chandra has responsibility for academic affairs;
distance and flexible learning and teaching; communications and
information technologies; USP Solutions and the Book Shop. He is
also the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Clarendon
Investments Limited, a company that will be the main conduit for
USP’s commercial activities.
Born in Maro, Nadroga, Fiji, Professor Chandra obtained his
secondary education at Cuvu College and Marist Brothers High
School. He obtained his BA, Graduate Certificate in Education and
MA from the University of the South Pacific and his PhD from the
University of British Columbia, Canada on a Canadian Commonwealth
Scholarship.
While working most of the time at the USP, Professor Chandra has
held visiting appointments at the University of Canterbury in New
Zealand, East-West Centre in Hawaii, McGill University in Canada,
and the Australian National University. He has visited numerous
universities.
Professor Chandra has published five books and over 50 articles.
His books include Maro, a study of a small Indo-Fijian
settlement; Population of Fiji, an edited volume;
Industrialization and Development in the Third World,
published by Routledge of London, and An Atlas of Fiji,
which he co-edited and which has been included as a text for
secondary schools in Fiji. His most recent article is on leading
change in higher education, published in a book entitled
Leadership for 21st Century Learning published last
year.
Although a Economic Geographer by training, Professor Chandra has
been concerned with higher education for more than a decade, and
has been instrumental in the development of strategic planning,
distance and flexible learning, and information technology at USP.
His expertise in these areas is recognized internationally. He was
a keynote speaker at a conference in 2001 on the development of a
regional draft policy on information and communications technology
in Noumea, New Caledonia. He was also a keynote speaker at the
inaugural conference of the Association of Caribbean Higher
Education Administrators in Jamaica, where he spoke on challenges
facing island universities.
Professor Chandra was, until recently, the Chairman of the
Executive Committee of the Commonwealth Universities Study Abroad
Consortium based in London, which is part of the Association of
the Commonwealth Universities, representing the whole Australasia
region. He is a member of the Technical Advisory Committee set up
by the Commonwealth of Learning in Vancouver to advise the
Ministers of Education on the feasibility of a virtual university
for small states. Professor Chandra is also a member of the Fiji
IT Advisory Committee.
Professor Chandra is married to Dharma Wati from Tavua, and
they have two children. |
