Lance Collins recognized as Top 10 Most Influential People of 2024 in Northern Virginia
Northern Virginia Magazine published its list of the top 50 Most Influential of 2024 in its October issue.
Lance Collins, vice president and executive director of the Virginia Tech Innovation Campus, was named the 8th most influential person in Northern Virginia Magazine’s 50 Most Influential 2024. The top 50 list, which was published in the magazine’s October issue, recognizes leaders in the Northern Virginia area who are making a difference in their communities.
Collins is joined in the top 10 by Governor Glenn Youngkin, Michelle Reid, superintendent of Fairfax County Public Schools, Dr. J. Stephen Jones, President and CEO of Inova healthcare system, Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-VA-11th), Dwight and Martha Schar, philanthropists, Victor Hoskins, president and CEO of Fairfax County Economic Development Authority, Sheila Johnson, CEO of Salamander Hotels & Resorts, Arvind Manocha, president and CEO of Wolf Trap, and Kathy Warden, chair, CEO, and president of Northrop Grumman and former member of the Innovation Campus advisory board.
Collins provides strategic direction for the Innovation Campus, which will open in January 2025. Since joining in August 2020, Collins has set the goal for the Innovation Campus to become the most diverse graduate technology campus in the country.
Through the unique project-based curriculum, he has created an environment that will educate technology’s next leaders who will have an enduring influence on the region’s ecosystem.
“The need for tech talent stretches across virtually every part of our economy,” said Collins during the interview with the magazine. “It’s not just that Amazon needs talent, but other sectors of industry and government from defense contractors, to banks, and retailers who are navigating the way that emerging technologies are influencing society and driving innovation in the future.”
Collins joined Virginia Tech from Cornell University where he served as the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering for 10 years. He was also part of the leadership team that successfully bid to partner with New York City to build Cornell Tech, which opened its Roosevelt Island campus in 2017. As the engineering dean at Cornell, Collins accelerated efforts to diversify the college’s faculty and student body, increasing the proportion of underrepresented minority students from 8 to 19 percent and undergraduate women from 33 to 50 percent.
Collins, a professor of mechanical engineering at Virginia Tech, serves on the board of trustees of the MITRE Corporation, the Society for Science, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Foundation. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. In 2021 he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering.
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ABOUT THE VIRGINIA TECH INNOVATION CAMPUS
The Virginia Tech Innovation Campus shapes the future of technology. Through our Master of Engineering program, we equip graduates to become leaders in their careers while helping them gain real-world experience solving urgent challenges alongside researchers, industry executives, and national policymakers. With a research focus on AI/ML, Wireless and Next Gen Technology, Quantum Information Science, and Intelligent Interfaces, the Innovation Campus is powering a pipeline of premier tech talent and building the foundation for a new era of technology. The 11-story, 300,000 sq. ft. first academic building for the Innovation Campus, located in Alexandria, VA, is set to open in spring 2025.
