Max Nkias - American Trojan

C. L. Max Nikias first arrived at USC in 1991, and has served as a professor, national research center director, engineering dean, provost, and president. He serves the university as a life trustee and as its president emeritus. During his tenure as president, Nikias advanced USC’s premier academic and global standing, led a generational upgrade and expansion of both of the university’s campuses, and created college pathways for low-income students. Every great story begins with a departure, a moment when familiar shores fade in favor of adventure and opportunities on a distant horizon. For Dr. C.L. Max Nikias, that moment came when conflict destroyed everything his family had built and they found themselves as refugees. At the time, he had no idea that those extraordinary challenges would form the early chapters of an improbable journey that would carry him and his wife, Niki, from a village of fewer than 1,000 people to the helm of one of America’s leading research universities. Get American Trojan on Amazon at amzn.to/4dXllXo American Trojan: Leadership, Resilience, and the Renewal of Higher Educationtells the story of how he and Niki crossed the Atlantic with virtually nothing to their names, equipped with only a deep faith in the power of education and the promise of the American Dream. In his 2010 inaugural address, Dr. Nikias invoked the image of Homer’s Odysseus returning home after a decade of struggle, comparing USC to his family’s own “Ithaca,” a new home where they built a life and raised their daughters as part of the Trojan Family.