Barry L. Shoop, Ph.D., P.E., is Dean of Engineering at the Albert Nerken School of Engineering at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Engineering in Manhattan, NY. 

Barry assumed his role at The Cooper Union on January 1, 2019. In this capacity, he leads the largest of The Cooper Union’s schools which is comprised of seven academic departments supporting an average enrollment of roughly 480 undergraduate and another 70 graduate students. Under his leadership, the School of Engineering has flourished. In the last four-years, the school has introduced four new minors including Computer Science, Bioengineering, Chemistry, and Humanities and Social Sciences; introduced a new type of course structure known as Vertically Integrated Projects (VIP) that engage students in a project-based experience over multiple semesters to apply disciplinary knowledge and gain important professional skills; hired 10 new tenure-track faculty increasing the number of women tenured and tenure-track faculty from 6.2% in 2013 to 42% in 2023; launched partnerships with the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, the Simons Foundation’s Flatiron Institute Center for Computational Astrophysics, Nokia Bell Laboratories, and NEC Laboratories America. Additionally, the School of Engineering has expanded the summer study abroad program to include Singapore, Italy, Bosnia in conjunction with La Trope University in Australia, and Santa Cruz del Quiche in Guatemala.

Prior to his current position, he retired as a Brigadier General after a 39-year career in the U.S. Army, with the last 25 years at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. While at West Point, he served in a number of key leadership roles including Director of the Photonics Research Center, Director of the Electrical Engineering Program and his last position was Professor and Head of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Earlier in his career, he was a satellite communication engineer responsible for the design and installation of a high-capacity, global digital communication network, and also the Chief Technology Officer for a US$4.5B organization addressing the Improvised Explosive Device (IED) challenge worldwide.

Dr. Shoop received a B.S. degree from the Pennsylvania State University and Ph.D. from Stanford University, both in Electrical Engineering. His research interests include optical information processing, neural networks, image processing, disruptive innovations and educational pedagogy. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), the Optical Society of America (OSA), and the International Society for Optical Engineering (SPIE). In addition, he is a member of Phi Kappa Phi, Eta Kappa Nu, and Sigma Xi. Dr. Shoop has served on the Board of Directors of OSA, ABET, and IEEE. In 2016, Dr. Shoop served as the IEEE President and CEO. In 2008, OSA recognized him with their Robert E. Hopkins Leadership Award and, in 2013, he received both the SPIE Educator Award and the IEEE Haraden Pratt Award. Dr. Shoop holds a patent on photonic analog-to-digital conversion and has authored over 150 archival publications as well as 8 books and book chapters. He is a licensed Professional Engineer in the Commonwealth of Virginia. In 2019, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering.