An Exceptional Presidency

By Nicole Peradotto

SATISH K. TRIPATHI understands why anyone tracing his journey from a remote hamlet in India to the helm of one of America’s leading public research universities might marvel at the odds of his rise. As a statistician and computer scientist, he has spent countless hours contemplating probability—how initial conditions shape outcomes, how unexpected variables can alter a trajectory.

Yet, any analysis of Tripathi’s ascendancy to UB’s presidency must account for forces that resist mathematical modeling. The formative guidance of his parents, his singular aptitude for math and science, his willingness to take calculated risks, and perhaps most defining, an enduring conviction in the transformative power of higher education—each of these factors subtly shifted the odds. Taken together, they turned what might have seemed, at first glance, an unexpected rise into one that feels not only plausible but almost inevitable.

One could make an equally compelling argument that Tripathi, who concludes his presidential tenure in July, has done more to advance the university than any leader before him.

Here, the numbers speak for themselves.

During Tripathi’s presidency, sponsored research expenditures grew by 65%. Full-time faculty increased by more than 15%, including the largest cohort of new faculty appointed in more than 60 years. Since SUNY established the Distinguished Faculty Academy in 1963, nearly half of UB’s inductees joined its ranks under Tripathi’s leadership.

The percentage of incoming students reporting a GPA of 3.75 or higher nearly tripled. UB also cemented its reputation as a global institution, consistently appearing among the top 30 U.S. universities for international enrollment. International research and academic partnerships expanded significantly, strengthening UB’s ties across continents and disciplines.

Philanthropy soared to unprecedented levels. The Boldly Buffalo campaign raised $1.1 billion, and UB received its three largest single gifts ever.

Seven academic departments were launched, expanding UB’s intellectual footprint and interdisciplinary influence. A dynamic entrepreneurial ecosystem was developed, spurring commercialization of UB innovations and encouraging economic development in Western New York and beyond.

At the same time, demand for a UB education surged, even during periods of declining enrollment nationally. For the current academic year, UB received a record number of first-year applications and welcomed the largest first-year class in its history.

Perhaps most visible to anyone walking UB’s three campuses, the physical evolution has been monumental. A combined 25 major renovations and new buildings have reshaped the living-learning environment. Additional construction, planned or underway, totals $1 billion.

As impressive as each achievement is on its own, their cumulative significance is undeniable. Over the course of Tripathi’s presidency, UB has risen 22 spots in U.S. News & World Report’s rankings of U.S. public universities and 44 spots among U.S. public and private universities.

And yet, when UB’s 15th president delivered his final State of the University address last fall, he deflected personal credit for these remarkable institutional gains. “All of our successes are shared success,” Tripathi said. “We have approached everything we do in the spirit of solidarity. That fact has made my tenure as president immensely rewarding. More importantly, it has made all things possible for our great university.”

That theme—accomplishment as collective endeavor—has been a refrain of Tripathi’s presidency. His leadership has been pivotal to UB’s most consequential achievements of the past 15 years. From enhancing clinical care and biomedical collaborations with the return of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences to downtown Buffalo, to leveraging interdisciplinary research to solve societal problems, to UB’s designation as both a flagship institution and home of the statewide Empire AI consortium—all have resulted from Tripathi’s determination to deepen the university’s impact locally, nationally and globally.

Even as these milestones accumulated, Tripathi framed them as the product of shared effort. Whether marking building openings, landmark gifts or UB’s rise in the rankings, he underscored the dedication of faculty, students, staff, alumni and partners. In his telling, UB’s achievements grew out of common purpose and a deep belief in what UB could become. That ethos, paired with his bold aspirations and steady leadership, earned him the confidence of an unusually broad coalition. From the outset, what resonated was not only the scope of his vision, but the principled way he pursued it.

While Tripathi has consistently highlighted the contributions of the broader UB community, UB’s dramatic progress reflects a set of priorities shaped by his leadership. The university’s ascent did not simply happen; it unfolded along a course he deliberately charted. And yet, returning to the trajectory that brought him to UB, it becomes clear that his own rise—like UB’s—was guided by a confluence of choices, influences and deeply held principles that defy simple formulas.

Tripathi grew up in a farming village in Uttar Pradesh, India, without running water or electricity. While few locals completed formal schooling beyond the 10th grade, his family was the exception. Tripathi’s paternal great-grandfather founded a Sanskrit school where Tripathi’s grandfather, a scholar of Sanskrit grammar, later taught. His father earned a master’s degree in Hindi, became a high school principal and served as a Hindi education officer. After retiring in the early 1990s, he established a girls’ school in the family’s village—now coeducational and managed by one of Tripathi’s brothers. (He has six siblings, all of whom still live in India.)

“In my family, education was a given,” Tripathi says. “My father told me, ‘If you’re number one in the class, I will support you in whatever you want to learn.’ That was good for me because he didn’t try to push me into one field. Language was his passion. I was the first in my family to go into math and science.”

Tripathi’s mother was educated through the seventh grade but possessed a strong facility with numbers. “When we would sit down to study, she knew compound interest, fractions—all those things. She was a bit self-taught but also had an aptitude for it. She was really smart in math, and she gave us an education, too.”

By 13, Tripathi realized that to grow academically, particularly in math and science, he would need to leave home. He had already attained a level where his math teacher would occasionally turn class over to him to instruct his peers. The Government Inter College (GIC) in Faizabad, 50 miles away, admitted only top-ranked students. His acceptance immersed him in a more rigorous academic milieu.

“It wasn’t a big decision. I wanted to study—that was all,” he says, recalling no trepidation about moving away from his family while still an adolescent.

This pattern of calm determination, intellectual curiosity and self-authorship sustained Tripathi through every stage of his education. It helped him thrive at the GIC and earn scholarships to one of India’s most elite institutions, Banaras Hindu University, where he graduated at the top of his class with an undergraduate degree in math, physics and statistics, as well as a master’s in statistics. At a time when few from his village considered migrating further than Kolkata or New Delhi, he moved to Canada, where he earned a second master’s degree in statistics from the University of Alberta, then a master’s and PhD from the University of Toronto in the emerging discipline of computer science.

“To some extent, it was intimidating to be in a new field,” he acknowledges. “But I had faced intimidation before. When you grow up in a small village with few amenities, when you’re brought up in the native language completely [a dialect of Hindi] and then you go to a very large university where the only language in the classroom is English, that’s intimidating right away. So you lose some of the confidence you had until you take exams, do well and regain your confidence.”

Take on challenges. Accept uncertainty. Develop mastery. That rhythm has propelled Tripathi throughout his career. At the University of Maryland-College Park (UMD), his first academic appointment after completing his PhD, he was named chair of the computer science department at 37, roughly 10 years younger than average. When, in 1997, he accepted the deanship of the Bourns College of Engineering—an unranked school at the University of California, Riverside—some colleagues questioned the move.

“Here I was in the top computer science department [at UMD]. I had finished my chairmanship, I was active in research, and I was considering going somewhere where I would need to build something,” he recalls. “People wondered if it was the right path for me. But I did my worst-case analysis: If it didn’t work out, I would be a faculty member there.”

It worked out. Over seven+ years as dean, Tripathi nearly quadrupled student enrollment and tripled faculty numbers, driving the college into the top half of the U.S. News & World Report’s Best Engineering Graduate Schools.

His record soon reached Buffalo; in 2004, he was named UB’s provost and vice president for academic affairs. Seven years later, he became the university’s first internationally born president.

Reflecting on his presidential tenure, Tripathi says his legacy is “for others to define,” but it’s clear his influence has touched every dimension of university life. “We’ve been able to collectively elevate the quality of the institution. We’re providing a better education to our students, we have excellent faculty, we’re making an economic impact—that’s what an institution should do,” Tripathi says.

In addition to the numerous accomplishments he helped orchestrate, Tripathi will be remembered for his steady leadership during difficult periods precipitated by local, national and international events.

“I would say the pandemic was the biggest challenge I navigated as president,” he says. “But with every challenge, the process is the same. We think about what is under our control—like choosing to pivot to online learning during the pandemic. With all challenges, I consider what information I have in that moment, and I don’t get overly concerned about things outside my control.”

Tripathi also stands out as the longest-serving president to lead UB since it joined the SUNY system in 1962. This longevity is particularly notable given that average presidential tenures have steadily declined—from 8.5 years in 2008 to 5.9 years in 2022—amid mounting pressures in the profession. How does he explain his staying power? “I have had a particularly good support system—excellent staff and leadership. I’ve enjoyed the work and progress we have made. That has always kept me motivated. What more do you need?”

As he prepares to conclude his presidency, Tripathi looks forward to returning to the faculty in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The transition will allow more time with his wife of 55 years, Kamlesh, and more opportunities to visit their sons, Manish and Aashish, and three grandchildren—Ryan, Maya and Milo—in Seattle. It will also give him room to reconnect with the intellectual endeavors that directed his academic arc. While his plans aren’t fully formed, he is interested in studying the ethics of artificial intelligence.

This new chapter marks a homecoming to the work that sparked Tripathi’s passion for academia: exploring ideas, collaborating, and immersing himself in innovation and discovery. Although those endeavors informed his presidency, his faculty role will enable him to pursue them with the depth that animated his path.

It is the same possibility Tripathi first envisioned by the light of a kerosene lamp: how education can sharpen a mind and expand a life. Over the course of his exceptional presidency, it is an opportunity he has worked tirelessly to strengthen for generations of UB students.

For Tripathi, the story of his presidency—and his life— has never been about beating the odds. It has been about creating possibility. As he concludes his presidential tenure, the university will carry forward the extraordinary momentum he cultivated, anchored in the transformative promise of higher education.

• Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
• Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Honorary doctorates from Maharaja Surajmal Brij University (India), Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad, and Brock University (Canada)
• Co-chair, Association of American Universities (AAU) Task Force on Expanding U.S.-India University Partnerships
• Board member, University Innovation Alliance
• Member, College Football Playoff Board of Managers
• Former chair, Mid-American Conference Council of Presidents
• Former chair, Internet2
• Past board service: AAU, NCAA Division I, NCAA Board of Governors, Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities, and Council for Higher Education Accreditation