Jelena Kovačević

For the Serbian politician, see Jelena Žarić Kovačević.

Jelena Kovačević
Born	Belgrade
Nationality	American
Education	University of Belgrade (BEE) Columbia University (PhD)
Occupation	Professor at NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering
Known for	Books : "Wavelets and Subband Coding" and "Foundations of Signal Processing"
Father	Živorad Kovačević
Academic background
Doctoral advisor	Martin Vetterli

Jelena Kovačević is a Serbian American engineering professor at the New York University Tandon School of Engineering. She served as dean of the school from 2018-2024.^[1]

Education

Kovačević received her Engineering Diploma Degree in electrical engineering from the University of Belgrade and her MS and PhD from Columbia University, under doctoral advisor Martin Vetterli, with whom she later co-authored multiple books on signal processing and wavelet theory.^[2][3]

Career

Kovačević became head of NYU Tandon School of Engineering in 2018, the first woman to do so in the school's 164-year history.^[4] At the end of her five-year term in May 2023, she announced she would be stepping down on August 31, 2024.^[1]

Kovačević  is an elected fellow of the IEEE ^[5] and EURASIP.^[6] She is a recipient of the  "Belgrade October Prize," the "E.I. Jury Award" from Columbia University, the "CIT Philip L. Dowd Fellowship Award" from Carnegie Mellon University, the IEEE Signal Processing Society Technical Achievement Award in 2016,^[7] and the IEEE Engineering in Medicine & Biology Society (EMBS) Career Achievement Award in 2022.^[8]

Family

Jelena Kovačević was born to Margita Kovačević and Živorad Kovačević, the latter of whom was a Yugoslav politician, diplomat, and academic, who was the 60th Mayor of Belgrade in 1974-1982 and Yugoslavia's Ambassador to the United States in 1987-1989, when he was recalled after his disapproval of Slobodan Milosević's regime.

References

1. Horvath, Bruna (May 3, 2023). "Tandon dean to step down next year". Washington Square News. Retrieved 2023-06-22.
2. "From Biomedical Imaging to Online Blogs: Graph Signal Processing | Electrical Engineering". www.ee.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2023-01-02.
3. "Jelena Kovačević". jelena.ece.cmu.edu. Retrieved 2023-01-02.
4. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2024-10-31). "Jelena Kovačević: Biography". IEEETV. Retrieved 2024-10-31.
5. Goodrich, Joanna (April 29, 2019). "Q&A With Jelena Kovačević, Dean of the NYU Tandon School of Engineering The IEEE Fellow talks about her career and her efforts to inspire other women to enter the field". IEEE Spectrum. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
6. European Association of Signal Processing (2012). "EURASIP Fellows". EURASIP. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
7. IEEE Women in Engineering (2018). "JELENA KOVAČEVIĆ". IEEE Women in Engineering (WIE). Retrieved October 31, 2024.
8. Zimmerman, Nancy (July 2022). "Academic Career Achievement Award: Jelena Kovacevic". IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. Retrieved October 31, 2024.