Santa Ono

Santa Jeremy Ono (小野 三太; born November 23, 1962) is a Canadian-American immunologist and academic administrator who has been serving as the 15th president of the University of Michigan since October 2022.

Ono 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. Previously, as a faculty member of Johns Hopkins University, Harvard University, University College London, and Emory University, Ono contributed to the field of gene regulation in the immune system and to the understanding of inflammation in the eye.

Early life and education
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 an assistant professor of mathematics 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 faculty member at the University of Pennsylvania from 1964 to 1969 and at Johns Hopkins University from 1969 to 2011, respectively. Ono is the older brother of mathematician Ken Ono.

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.

Academic research
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, and Emory University. He was GlaxoSmithKline Chair of Biomedical Science and head of the department of immunology at the University College London 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, United States. He was promoted to senior vice provost for undergraduate education and academic affairs of Emory University 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.

Ono has studied on ocular surface inflammation and the immune basis of age-related macular degeneration. His early work focused on the association of certain MHC haplotypes with susceptibility and resistance to type 1 diabetes. Using a number of recombinant and congenic rat strains, the work mapped susceptibility genes in the BB rat to the class II MHC loci. His work also showed that class I and II MHC gene products are expressed at higher levels or de novo on the insulin-producing beta cells of the islets of Langerhans. He focused much of his research in the next decade on the regulation of MHC gene expression. He showed that the different class II MHC isotypes are differentially expressed and showed that the X2-box cis-element controls this differential expression. His work also showed that the bZIP transcription factor: XBP1 forms a hetero-dimer with c-Fos. This has turned out to be relevant to the developmental control of B cell differentiation. His lab also discovered the NFX1 transcription factor and cloned both the human and murine cDNAs. This factor can bind DNA, RNA and protein via a reiterated RING finger motifs in the central domain of the polypeptide. The protein appears to have important roles in neuronal development and mRNA transport. NFX1 is also a probable E3 ubiquitin-protein ligase. These enzymes are of interest as they have been shown to participate in 3 metabolic pathways: ubiquitin mediated proteolysis, parkinson's disease, and huntington's disease. His lab also demonstrated that the non- histone chromosomal protein HMGA is required for the induction of multiple genes, including MHC genes, interferon-gamma and rhodopsin. They mapped the interaction of HMGA1a and the paired homeodomain motif within Crx and showed that these interactions help recruit such transcriptional activators to the promoter/enhancer.

Using transgenic mouse technology, they also showed (concurrently and independently of Alfredo Fusco), that fusion proteins between HMGA2 and other C terminal peptides (following chromosomal translocation) can drive the development of lipomas and generate obese mice. Further contributions in the field include the mapping of the HMGA2 promoter/enhancer.

More recently, his laboratory determined the role of beta-chemokines in mast cell-dependent inflammation in the ocular surface. The work showed that chemokines not only contribute to leukocyte recruitment, but can cooperate with other mast cell activation signals to trigger mast cell degranulation. Finally, his lab showed that certain autoantibodies might contribute to the pathogenesis or exacerbation of AMD and other rapid onset retinal degenerative diseases and may constitute useful biomarkers for the screening for AMD and its progression.

Academic administration
At Harvard, he served as head of the Inflammation, Immunity and Transplantation Focus Group at the Schepens Eye Research Institute. There, he served on the executive committee of the Harvard Program in Immunology and on two NIH Training grants within ophthalmology (Ocular Immunology and Molecular Bases of Eye Diseases). He worked with the late president J. Wayne Streilein and COO Ken Trevett and others in developing a strategic plan for the Schepens Eye Research Institute at Harvard and helped attract funding from entities such as the Markey Charitable Trust and the Fidelity Investments.

Ono was then recruited to University College London to the Cumberlege Chair and then as GSK Professor. Major funding from the Wellcome Trust, Fight for Sight, and GSK supported the development of a new immunology division at the University College London-Institute of Ophthalmology which grew to 27 members. While at UCL, he also took on administrative duties including as associate dean of students and as a member of the University College London Council (the university's governing board).

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.

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.

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 the University of Cincinnati, 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. The University of Cincinnati also invested heavily in faculty recruitment, bringing more than 300 new faculty to the university in cluster hires.

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.

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

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

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

Ono has served on the governing bodies/board of trustees of University College London, Intervarsity Christian Fellowship US, World Affairs Council of Cincinnati, Alois Alzheimer Center, Strive for College, the Japan America Society, the Taft Center at University of Cincinnati, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, University of Cincinnati Foundation and Trent School Cockfosters, Church of England. He has served ex officio on the Presidential Advisory Committee at Emory University. He is a founding member of the board of the Posse Foundation, Atlanta and has served on the Medical & Scientific Advisory Board of the Tear Film and Ocular Surface Society (TFOS) the Medical Advisory Board and College of Experts of the Medical Research Council, UK and the IMS and HAI study sections of the United States National Institutes of Health. Ono has served on the Council of the Intervarsity Christian Fellowship of Georgia and the selection committee for the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation National Graduate Scholarships.

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.

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.

Public communications
Ono has written on research and innovation, college rankings, healthcare, STEM education, diversity, social media, and more.

Ono has also reached out to the public by giving talks at K–12 schools in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada and to the general public at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, where he gave talks to K–12 students in the Student Education program and to adult audiences in the Talking Points Evening Lecture Series. He has also served as an invited panelist to discuss the Reith Lectures at Windsor Castle on BBC Radio 4.

He has spoken and written frequently on the issue of mental health in adolescents and young adults and advocated for enhanced funding for identifying at-risk youth and for early mental health interventions.

During his term as president of the University of Michigan, Santa Ono condemned the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas twice and prevented tearing down posters of Israeli hostages hung around the campus. Ono also prevented the central student government from voting on two resolutions related to the Hamas-Israel war and the BDS movement.

On May 21, 2024, Ono sent police to clear a pro-Palestinian encampment on The Diag, in front of the Hatcher Graduate Library. The encampment was first set up on April 22 of the same year to protest for divestment from Israel. Ono claimed that fire hazards were the reasons for the clearing. Four protestors were arrested.

Relationship with Organized Labor
Ono's inauguration ceremony on March 7, 2023 as president of the University of Michigan, was marked both by protests from the Graduate Employees' Organization and administrators' insistence that students write and perform poetry praising his leadership style. The Graduate Employees' Organization (GEO) is a labor union that represents about 2,300 graduate student instructors and graduate assistants. On March 29, 2023 — 22 days into his presidency — Ono led the University of Michigan into what became the longest labor strike in the institution's history. A majority of instructors in GEO went on strike because their 24,000 dollar compensation package was not adjusted for the 38,000 dollar cost of living in Ann Arbor. The strike began as over six months of negotiations between employees and HR had failed to produce a new three-year contract. Instructors' salary demands for a living wage totaling about 33 million dollars would have amounted to a 0.28% increase in the university's 13.4 billion revenue in the 2023-24 academic year.

Ono responded to the strike by seeking but failing to win an injunction against GEO membership, with his administrators claiming in court that strikers were causing "irreparable harm to the university." When Ono was challenged by union members in a downtown restaurant on April 20, he called police to arrest and handcuff the protesters — off campus. In response, Ono pursued felony charges against the protestors, but the Washtenaw County Prosecuting Attorney declined to press charges for lack of evidence that strike actions violated protected speech. Footage of the detentions racked up over 1.4 million views on social media. Ono further withheld hundreds of thousands of dollars in compensation from strikers, directed leadership to hire other students as strikebreakers, and caused administrators to invent the final grades of students they had not taught. These actions and others prompted the Higher Learning Commission to announce an investigation into possible academic misconduct by university leadership, which was later dropped. As the strike extended into the spring, Ono cancelled attendance at scheduled campus events, became less visible around campus in casual settings, and posted less to social media.

The strike officially ended five months later in August 25, 2023 when the university agreed to almost all of the strikers' demands, and a 97 percent majority of GEO members ratified the contract.

Honors
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.

Ono is the recipient of the Pharmacia International Award in Allergy Research (the top international prize awarded to inflammation researchers under the age of 40), a Helen Hay Whitney Fellowship, the American Diabetes Association Career Development Award, the Arthritis Foundation Investigator Award, a Lucille P. Markey Charitable Trust Award, the Medal in Bronze from Osaka City University and the Roche Award presented at University of Texas Medical Branch.

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.

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 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.

He has delivered plenary or major lectures at: the International Congress of Immunology, the International Congress of Eye Research, the Annual Meetings of ARVO and AAAAI and the Kyoto Cornea Conference. Ono has been a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Visiting Professor at Kyoto University and a Genentech Visiting Professor at the University of Cincinnati.

Personal life
Santa Ono was named after Santaro, a Japanese folk story character. Ono, a practicing Anglican, is a member of the Anglican Communion Science Commission and has served as a lay Eucharistic minister.

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.

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, a Chinese-Canadian professor of electrical and computer engineering at McGill University, and her mother is Alice Chan-Yip , a Chinese-Canadian pediatrician based in Montreal and former board member with the Montreal Chinese Hospital.