Webb Institute announced the appointment of Mr. Richard P. Neilson as its next Academic Dean.  Neilson will assume responsibility for the academic program on July 1 of this year, succeeding Dr. Roger H. Compton, Dean since 1998.
Mr. Neilson, a 1970 graduate of Webb, returns to his alma mater after a long and distinguished career in the marine industry.  Immediately after graduation he worked for the United States Coast Guard in Washington, D.C., in the Design Branch of their Naval Engineering Division.  From 1974 to 1979 he was with Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company and then with Sun Shipbuilding and Dry Dock as a naval architect in the Tanker Product Group and as Supervisor of Structural Engineering. In 1979 Mr. Neilson returned to Webb, where he was Professor of Naval Architecture and Ship Design for  seven years.  In 1981 he also completed a Master of Science in Engineering degree from Pennsylvania

State University.  In 1987 he returned to Newport News Shipbuilding, where in the next nine years he served as Manager of the Surface Ship Research and Development Group and then as Manager of the Commercial Ship Design and Ship Repair Engineering Group. In the fifteen years prior to his accepting the Dean’s position at Webb Institute, Mr. Neilson worked for the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), both here and abroad.  He served in a number of capacities,

including Director of Technology and Business Development with ABS Americas and Vice-President of Engineering for ABS Europe’s offices in London, Hamburg, Piraeus, and Genoa.  From 2005 through 2010 he was Vice-President, Marine Technology. The Webb community looks forward to welcoming Rick and his wife, Denise, to the Webb campus.