Santa Ono

On July 13, 2022, Ono was named the 15th president of the University of Michigan. He became the first Asian American to lead the university when his five-year term began.

Ono was elected into the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2022 He has also been elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Academy of Inventors, the Johns Hopkins Society of Scholars, the Royal Society of Medicine, the Royal Society of Chemistry and Fellow of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. He was elected International Fellow, American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology (AAAAI) and of the Collegium Internationale Allergologicum and in 2017 the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences. He has been a member of the Faculty of 1000 since 2003.

On January 23, 2017, Ono was appointed chief advisor of the British Columbia Innovation Network and a member of the BC Technology Council.

On June 15, 2016, Ono was named the 15th president and vice chancellor of the University of British Columbia (UBC), effective August 15. He was re-appointed for a second five-year term on August 11, 2020.

Ono received an honorary doctorate degree from Chiba University in Japan in 2016 and an honorary doctor of divinity from the Vancouver School of Theology of the University of British Columbia in 2020.

In 2016, he was awarded the Reginald Wilson Diversity Leadership Award from the American Council on Education and the NAAAP100 Award from the National Association of Asian American Professionals. In 2017, he received a Professional Achievement Award from the University of Chicago Alumni Association. He has been recognized as an outstanding mentor at Phi Beta Kappa ceremonies and received the JW McConnell Award for Potential in Teaching at McGill University.

Inside Higher Education named Ono America's most notable university president in 2015. Upworthy has profiled him as one of 9 high-profile CEOs in the world who exemplify servant leadership.

At Emory, he also served as the faculty advisor for Emory Christian Fellowship and the Alpha Theta chapter of Alpha Tau Omega fraternity. He was elected to the national board of directors of Alpha Tau Omega in 2014.

In 2012, Ono was named the 28th president of the University of Cincinnati, and became the first Asian-American president of that university and in the state of Ohio. At UC Ono lead the implementation of the Academic Master Plan that invested $100 million into academics at the institution, including strengthening advising, the Honors Program and Study Abroad. During his tenure the university completed a $1 billion capital campaign 5 months ahead of schedule. Considerable investment in the campus and surrounding area occurred during his tenure, including renovations of 6 colleges and of Nippert Stadium and Fifth Third Arena. U Square at the Loop, a $78 million mixed use development was opened during his presidency. UC also invested heavily in faculty recruitment, bringing more than 300 new faculty to the university in cluster hires.

In June 2010, he was named senior vice president for academic affairs and university provost at the University of Cincinnati, with oversight of budgets, personnel, and planning. During that time, he helped lead major initiatives, including Phase I of the university's Academic Master Plan which was released on April 11, 2011.

Ono completed his postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University supported by the Helen Hay Whitney Foundation and then held faculty positions at Johns Hopkins University, Harvard University, University College London (UCL), and Emory University. He was GlaxoSmithKline Chair of Biomedical Science and head of the department of immunology at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology and honorary staff member at Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. From March 2006 until September 2008, he served as vice provost for academic initiatives and deputy to the provost at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He was promoted to senior vice provost for undergraduate education and academic affairs of Emory in September 2008 and also served as professor of ophthalmology, medicine, pediatrics and biology. In September 2010, he became senior vice president and provost for academic affairs at the University of Cincinnati.

In 2006, Ono moved to Emory University as senior vice provost for undergraduate education and academic affairs. He had oversight of student enrollment activities, certain aspects of academic affairs and other responsibilities related to initiatives within the university strategic plan.

He has served as associate editor of Immunology and the Journal of Leukocyte Biology and on the editorial boards of the Journal of Biological Chemistry, the Journal of Immunology and the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. He chaired the Novartis Foundation Symposium in 2004 and has participated in three Keck Futures Initiatives of the United States National Academy of Sciences.

Wendy Yip received a bachelor of science with a major in immunology from McGill University in 1988 and a juris doctor from Boston University in 1991. Her father is Gar Lam Yip (Chinese: 叶嘉林), a Chinese Canadian professor of electrical and computer engineering at McGill University; her mother is Alice Chan-Yip (Chinese: 陈敏娜), a Chinese Canadian pediatrician based in Montreal and a former board member with the Montreal Chinese Hospital.

Ono met Gwendolyn "Wendy" Yip at McGill University in 1985; Yip was in her undergraduate senior year when Ono came to the university to complete his PhD work. The pair married in 1989 and have two daughters together.

Ono received a bachelor of arts with a major in biological science from the University of Chicago in 1984 and a doctor of philosophy in experimental medicine from McGill University in Canada in 1991.

Santa Jeremy Ono FRSC FCAHS (Japanese: 小野 三太; born November 23, 1962) is a Canadian-American immunologist and academic administrator, currently serving as the 15th president of the University of Michigan since October 2022. Ono previously served as the 15th president of the University of British Columbia from 2016 to 2022 and the 28th president of the University of Cincinnati from 2012 to 2016.

Born in 1962, Santa Ono is the son of mathematician Takashi Ono, who immigrated to the United States from Japan in the late 1950s. Ono was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, where his father worked as a mathematics professor at the University of British Columbia from 1961 to 1964. As a result, Ono acquired United States citizenship by jus sanguinis and Canadian citizenship by jus soli. Ono was raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Towson, Maryland, where his father worked as a tenured professor at the University of Pennsylvania from 1964 to 1969 and at Johns Hopkins University since 1969.