A Rising Star

A rising star in international academia, Pavlos Karakoltsidis is currently the vice president for academic affairs and president for the research committee of the Alexander Technological Educational Institute of Thessaloniki (A-TEI) in Greece, a school with 30,000 students and 500 educational staff.

“I coordinate every national and international program from a financial standpoint,” he says. Since arriving at A-TEI, Pavlos’ career trajectory has been impressive. He has ascended from assistant professor to chair of the Department of Food Technology to his current position in just over a dozen years.

Professor Emeritus Spiros Constantinides, Karakoltsidis’ advisor during his graduate studies at URI and now a good friend, attests to his former student’s abilities: “He demonstrates an exceptional ability to teach and conduct research, and his presence in the laboratory makes you look forward to being there to happily pursue your research activities.”

Karakoltsidis research has been highly acclaimed in areas of food science and technology. He has published his findings in dozens of prominent journals on his way to becoming a foremost authority in the field. While he was in Rhode Island, a major part of his research centered on marine food technology. One paper he authored at the time, “Chemical Composition and Protein Quality of Some Southern New England Marine Species,” was published in The Journal of Food Science.

Karakoltsidis credits his URI experience with many aspects of his professional development, but one truly stands out. “The best lesson I learned in the States was to have confidence in my own knowledge,” he says. “Having this as a tool and as ammunition has allowed me to handle any difficult situation—at least so far!”

As a graduate student in Kingston, Karakoltsidis showed clear signs of leadership ability; that ability has surfaced in a big way in his native Greece—so much so that he is now a possible future president of Alexander Technological Educational Institute.

—Bob Gulla
PHOTO COURTESY OF PAVLOS KARAKOLTSIDIS