Delgado Vice Chancellor and Provost Joins RTA Board of Commissioners

November 19, 2018

Mostofa Sarwar, Ph.D., interim vice chancellor of Academic Affairs and provost at Delgado Community College, has joined the Board of Commissioners for the New Orleans Regional Transit Authority (RTA). 

Orleans Parish Civil District Court Judge Kern A. Reese swore in Sarwar at ceremonies on November 13. RTA serves New Orleans and Jefferson parishes, providing bus, streetcar and ferry service and paratransit. Its famous streetcar is the longest continually operating streetcar system in the world, with a cultural impact known and celebrated worldwide. 

Sarwar said he believes that an efficient public transportation is required for a city to be great. “Riders, concerned citizens, business leaders, transportation workers, advocacy groups, administrators and politicians should build consensus for transformative changes in public transportation,” he said. Sarwar noted that he is passionate to help lead RTA as a team member for improving service for residents and visitors. 

Sarwar came to Delgado as dean of the Science and Math Division in February 2018. Before joining Delgado, he was at the University of New Orleans as associate provost, professor of geophysics, director of the University Honors Program and academic director of the UNO-Innsbruck International Summer School in Innsbruck, Austria. 

Sarwar also taught at the University of Pennsylvania, Indiana University, Dhaka University and UNO-Innsbruck. He co-authored a book entitled “Theory and Practice of Geophysical Data Inversion.” His hobby is creative writing and he has published three books of Bengali poems. 

Sarwar is married to Syeda F. Sarwar, M.D., a staff pathologist at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in New Orleans. They have two sons, Turhan and Arush, both graduates of Harvard University, and a daughter, Shaina, who graduated from Tulane University and is now pursuing her M.D. degree at LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans.