Aaron Brower is the founding Executive Director for the University of Wisconsin Extended Campus, and the Senior Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs at the UW System. UWEX has built a national reputation for award-winning innovative online programs for adults and professionals. Among UWEX’s innovations is the UW Flexible Option, the first-in-the-country (and still only) competency-based educational program run throughout an entire statewide system.
From 2012-2018, Brower served as Provost of UW-Extension (and Interim Chancellor of UW Colleges and UW-Extension during 2014). From 2007-2021, he was UW-Madison’s Vice Provost for Teaching & Learning. Brower remains a tenured professor at UW-Madison’s School of Social Work. Brower earned a dual Ph.D. in Psychology and Social Work in 1985 from the University of Michigan.
Brower has written 5 books, more than 50 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, and received over $18M in grants to support his work. His scholarship demonstrates the academic and social outcomes produced when colleges blend in- and out-of-class learning – engaging the whole university to support the entire student. His current work develops a new educational approach that allows people to customize the unbundling and rebundling of education and training throughout their lives.