The University of Texas at Dallas honored 23 faculty members in the 2025 Investiture Ceremony, including six from the Naveen Jindal School of Management. This was the University’s largest group since the first UT Dallas investiture in 2012, when 69 were honored over five days.

The honorees were recognized before their families, colleagues, mentors and students. After being introduced by a student who had been mentored by them, each honoree received a medallion from Dr. Richard C. Benson, UTD’s president, and Dr. Inga Musselman, vice president for academic affairs and provost.

Investitures are considered the highest honor that a university can bestow. Included with each honor is a stipend to fund scholarly activities and support research. Among the oldest traditions in academia, dating back more than 500 years, ceremony participants don full academic regalia.

Philanthropic donations, including those established by or honoring the University’s founders and early leaders, make the investitures — either chairs or professorships — possible.

This year’s honorees are:

1. Dr. Srinivasan Raghunathan, Mike Brodie Family Distinguished Professor
2. Dr. Huseyin Cavusoglu, Ashbel Smith Professor
3. Dr. Seung-Hyun Lee, Ashbel Smith Professor
4. Dr. Cuili Qian, Ashbel Smith Professor
5. Dr. Huibing (Harold) Zhang, Ashbel Smith Professor

Dr. Zhiqiang (Eric) Zheng was also named the George and Fonsa Brody Distinguished Professor in Management, but he deferred to a future ceremony.

Raghunathan, in his acceptance speech, thanked the Brodie family, members of whom were in attendance, for establishing the endowment.

“First of all, I want to thank the Brody family for establishing this endowment,” he said. “… It, of course, provides significant support to carry on with such activities. I also want to thank UT Dallas — and JSOM in particular — for creating and nurturing an environment that supports high-quality research. More importantly, I am very happy that the school has maintained this environment even as it has grown so much in the last 25 years that I have been here.”