Chiang, currently president of Purdue University, will assume the role on July 1, Northwestern's Board of Trustees announced May 18. He succeeds Michael Schill, who resigned in September 2025 under pressure from the Trump administration. President Emeritus Henry Bienen has served as interim president since.
"I am honored and thrilled to be Northwestern's next president," Chiang said in the university's press release. "I have long admired Northwestern for its dedication to interdisciplinary scholarship, artistic creation and impactful research, its tremendous healthcare system, and its palpable school spirit."
In a separate message to the Northwestern community, he invoked the university's Latin motto. "Now is the moment to protect and advance the freedom to seek truth, as is stated in our motto and featured in our University seal: Quaecumque sunt vera: Whatsoever things are true," he wrote.
Mung Chiang, next president of Northwestern University, U.S. Photo courtesy of Purdue University
Chiang moved from Tianjin to Hong Kong at age 11 in 1988 and went on to attend the elite Queen's College in Tin Hau, Hong Kong newspaper The Standard reported. He became one of four students from the school that year to score 10 As in the Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination, and the following year was named Student Linguist of the Year by the South China Morning Post.
