Curt Rice

Curtis Calvin Rice (born 1962) is an American-born Norwegian linguist. He was the rector of the Norwegian University of Life Sciences from 2021 to 2023. Until 2021, he was the rector of Oslo Metropolitan University and formerly of its predecessor institution, Oslo and Akershus University College. Rice was the first rector of Oslo Metropolitan University who was not elected. He began his rectorship at Oslo Metropolitan University on 1 August 2015. A major issue of his tenure as rector has been the question of whether HiOA should apply for the status of a university to become one of Norway's new universities; it received this status on 12 January 2018. Rice is known for controversial views on the status of the Norwegian language in academia, having called for a ban on research papers in Norwegian. and served as Pro-Rector for Research and Development 2009–2013. He was also director of the Center for Advanced Study in Theoretical Linguistics (CASTL) at the University of Tromsø. In 2012, Rice applied unsuccessfully for the rector position at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

In 2015 he was appointed as the first non-elected rector of Oslo and Akershus University College. The college received the status of a university in 2018, and became Oslo Metropolitan University.

In April 2024, it was announced that Rice would be the new Executive Director of Fulbright Norway.

Norwegian academic controversy Rice is known for controversial views on the use of the Norwegian language in academia, which have been criticized by the Language Council of Norway and Norwegian academics and media on several occasions. He has called for "banning research papers in Norwegian" and claimed that academics who write in Norwegian "abdicate as academics." He has also called for less use of Norwegian in higher education and more use of English. He has instituted policies at Oslo Metropolitan University that no longer require fluency in Norwegian, which drew widespread criticism. His views have been noted to be at odds with the government's policy of promoting the Norwegian language in research and higher education. Dagbladet commentator Inger Merete Hobbelstad has noted that "Curt Rice would probably have liked being in Norwegian academia, had it not been Norwegian." His promotion of the name "OsloMet", and subsequently his promotion of the English name as the primary name, was criticized by the Language Council, linguists, politicians and media commentators.

Rice has chaired the Committee on Gender Equality and Diversity in Research and the board of CRIStin.

Writing Rice blogs for The Guardian about open access, leadership, and gender equality issues in higher education.