Merrill M Flood, Professor of Education, retired from active faculty status as of December 31, 1976.

Professor Flood was educated in Lincoln, Nebraska, receiving a degree of Master of Arts in mathematics and physics from the University of Nebraska, where he also served as Instructor in Mathematics from 1929 to 1931. He continued his education and research in mathematics at Princeton University, earning the doctorate there in 1935, and from 1931 to 1946 advanced from Instructor in Mathematics to Assistant Professor and Director of the Applied Mathematics Group.

In 1956 Mr. Flood came to The University of Michigan as Professor of Industrial Engineering and served for the first two years also as Associate Director of the Engineering Research Institute, Head of the Willow Run Laboratories, and Director of Project MICHIGAN. From 1959 through 1967 he was also Professor of Mathematical Biology in the Department of Psychiatry of the Medical School and Senior Research Mathematician in the Mental Health Research Institute. Many of his former students and research assistants are now themselves internationally famous for their researches in applying mathematics for the solution of problems in many fields.

Dr. Flood left the University to serve at the University of California and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He returned to The University of Michigan in 1974 as Professor of Education and Director of the Faculty Research Program on University Governance, a three-year part-time research effort established by the Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs by action of the Senate Assembly. The School of Education administered this program. Through his own pioneering mathematical research on governance theory and process, and related work by students and faculty members stimulated by his results, there is reason to expect that Professor Flood may once again have shown how modern mathematics and management science can be useful in dealing in new ways with problems of urgent importance for bettering human life.

Professor Flood's research is distinguished by its pioneering character and for its potential for application to human affairs. His influence will be felt not only through his own extensive publication but also through the future efforts of his many students, research assistants, and former colleagues.

The Regents now salute this distinguished professor for his dedicated service by naming him Professor Emeritus of Education.