Biography
Umpleby attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he received degrees in engineering in 1967, in political science in 1967 and in 1969, and a PhD in communications in 1975.
In the 1960s, while a student at the University of Illinois, Umpleby worked in the Institute of Communications Research, The Biological Computer Laboratory and the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory (the PLATO system). From 1967 to 1975 he and other students developed computer conferencing systems and other applications for time shared computers.
After moving to George Washington University, he was the moderator from 1977 to 1980, of a computer conference on general systems theory supported by the National Science Foundation. Between 1982 and 1988 he arranged scientific meetings involving American and Soviet scientists in the area of cybernetics and general systems theory.
From 1975 to present he has been a professor in the Department of Management at The George Washington University, where he teaches courses ranging from cybernetics, systems theory, and system dynamics to the philosophy of science, cross-cultural management, and organizational behavior. From 1994 to 1997 he was the faculty facilitator of a Quality and Innovation Initiative in the GW School of Business.
He is a past president of the American Society for Cybernetics (ASC). In 2007 Stuart Umpleby was awarded The Wiener Gold Medal of the American Society for Cybernetics. In 2010 he was elected an Academician in the International Academy of Systems and Cybernetic Sciences, an honor society created by the International Federation for Systems Research. He is twice divorced and has two sons.
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