Ken Baerenklau

Dr. Ken Baerenklau is the Interim Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Education at the University of California, Riverside. He is also UCR’s Associate Provost and serves as a cabinet member for both the Chancellor and the Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor. Ken works on a wide range of issues both internal and external to the campus which include leading a variety of academic planning efforts; coordinating faculty hiring and student success initiatives; assisting with institutional and capital planning, campus budgeting, and enrollment management; leading campus-level assessment activities; and liaising with deans and the Academic Senate.

Ken joined UCR in 2002 as an assistant professor of environmental economics and policy in the Department of Environmental Sciences. In 2008, he became an associate professor and remained in the Department of Environmental Sciences until moving to UCR’s new School of Public Policy in 2014, where he is currently a professor. From 2008 to 2012, Ken served as Associate Dean for Graduate Academic Affairs in UCR's Graduate Division.

Ken's research focuses on water resource economics and policy. He has served as an Adjunct Fellow in the Water Policy Center at the Public Policy Institute of California, as an Associate Editor for Water Resources Research, and on the editorial boards for the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Land Economics, and Water Economics and Policy. Ken has a Ph.D. in Applied Economics from the University of Wisconsin – Madison, an M.S. in Environmental Engineering and Science, and a B.S. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Stanford University.

As the Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Education, Ken works closely with colleagues from across the campus to help each UCR student exceed their own expectations, and to advance the University’s goals of inclusive excellence and upward social mobility.