Dear Colleagues,

I share with you the sad news from Jay Kapellusch in the College of Health Sciences, that Dr. Arun Garg, UWM Distinguished Professor and Director for the Center of Ergonomics, in CHS’s Department of Occupational Science and Technology, passed away Sunday evening.

Dr. Garg began his formal academic career in 1976 when he joined the Industrial Engineering faculty of the University of Florida in Miami as an Assistant Professor. The next year, he was recruited by UWM and joined the faculty of the Industrial and Systems Engineering Department in the College of Engineering and Applied Science in September 1977. In 2007, Dr. Garg was appointed as a UWM and Wisconsin Distinguished Professor. In August of 2013, he moved to the College of Health Sciences to join the Department of Occupational Science & Technology.

Dr. Garg’s accomplishments were many, and span decades of groundbreaking work in his field. He developed many ergonomics job analysis methods used worldwide. Dr. Garg published more than 200 peer-reviewed journal articles, and won the Thomas E. Hanson Editorial Award of Excellence from Plant Engineering (1981) and Paper of the Year from the American Industrial Hygiene Association Journal (1996).  He also served the campus by developing and administering academic programs.  In partnership with Phyllis King and the College of Health Sciences and the College of Nursing, he created the Certificate in Ergonomics Program in 1997, the first of its kind in the United States.  In 2002, he became Chair of the Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, a role he fulfilled until departing the College of Engineering and Applied Science in 2013.

Dr. Garg’s obituary is online. Visitation services will be held on Wednesday, May 16, from 3:30-4:30 p.m., at Krause Funeral Home, 21600 W. Capitol Drive in Brookfield.

Our condolences to Arun’s family and to the many others whose lives he touched.

Take care,

Johannes

Johannes Britz
Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs