Office of the Vice President for Information Technology: Robert Lowden

Robert Lowden
Associate Vice President Enterprise Software

Robert Lowden is a proven efficiency-minded leader, a pioneer in leading multi-campus open source software projects, and an award-winning visionary behind major IT infrastructure projects at Indiana University. As Associate Vice President for Enterprise Software, Lowden leads a division in the ongoing implementation of parts of Empowering People: IU's Strategic Plan for IT, partnering with IU academic and administrative offices to further the university's leading role in areas such as cost reducing, open source software like Kuali and Sakai. Lowden has worked at every level of IU's IT organization. In 1998, Lowden began his IU career as a student hourly network administrator in the Adaptive Educational Services computer lab at IUPUI. Lowden later joined UITS in the frontline support center, before moving to a small team that explored the potential of Oncourse and online course delivery. Most recently, Lowden served as director of system infrastructure, garnering recognition by the Computerworld Honors Laureate Program in 2008 and 2009 for large-scale strategic planning and implementation of major IT infrastructure projects. During the Persian Gulf War, Lowden interrupted his college career to enlist in the armed forces. While serving in the Navy, Lowden earned his Surface Warfare qualification and served as a Search and Rescue swimmer. In the late nineties, Lowden decided to move on from the Navy to finish his college degree, and he has since earned a graduate degree from Purdue University. Lowden is the second UITS associate vice president who began their career as a student hourly.

Selected National Leadership, Publications, and Presentations

Advisory Board Member, Kelley Institute for Business Analytics 2013
Lowden, R. & Hostetter, C. (2011). Access, utility, imperfection: The impact of videoconferencing on perceptions of social presence. Computers in Human Behavior. 28 (2012) pp. 377-383.
Kuali Student Board Member, 2011-Present
EDUCAUSE Enterprise 2011, Illinois
EDUCAUSE half-day cloud computing seminar 2010, California
Gartner CIO Leadership Summit Keynote, Phoenix, Arizona, 2010
Burton Group Europe and North America Presentation, Prague / San Diego, 2010
ComputerWorld Honors Laureate Recipient, Washington, DC, 2008 and 2009
Sakai Conference: Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2007 and Paris, France, 2008