Samuel Hoi

Samuel Hoi is the president of Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). He is an experienced and innovative higher education leader, and an advocate for art and design education and creative professionals as drivers in social, economic, and cultural advancement.

At MICA, he has ushered in its creative entrepreneurship efforts, steered its mission and vision re-articulation and college-wide DEIG (diversity, equity, inclusion, and globalization) initiative. As president of Otis College of Art and Design for 14 years from 2000 – 2014, he shepherded the Creative Action curriculum that places art and design education in real life and community context. He also launched the annual Otis Report on the Creative Economy of the Los Angeles Region, which was expanded statewide in California. While serving as dean of the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington, D.C., he created a visual arts program serving inner-city youth that received a Coming Up Taller Award from the President’s Committee on Arts and Humanities. 

Born and raised in Hong Kong, Hoi received his BA from Columbia College in New York City, his JD from Columbia Law School, and his AAS degree in Illustration from Parsons School of Design. Hoi is a recipient of honorary doctorate degrees from the Corcoran College of Art and Design and Otis College of Art and Design; decoration by the French government as an Officer of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques; and the Ford Foundation’s Art of Change Fellowship that recognizes U.S. artists and cultural leaders at the forefront of social change.