Rate My Professor Lakshman Ratnayake

Professor Lakshman Ratnayake is the Chancellor and Chairman of the Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology (SLIIT), bringing over 45 years of experience in higher education and engineering. He previously served as Chairman and Senior Professor of Civil Engineering at SLIIT from April 2014. Before joining SLIIT, he held key positions at the University of Moratuwa, including Senior Professor, Head of the Department of Civil Engineering from 1989 to 1994, and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering from 1995 to 2001. During sabbaticals, he occupied professorial positions at the University of Calgary in Canada and Utah State University in the USA. He was honored as Emeritus Professor by the University of Moratuwa in 2014. Additionally, he served as Vice Chairman of the University Grants Commission from 2001 to 2006, President of the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka in 2002, and President of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport in 2004. He led two World Bank-funded higher education projects, HETC and IRQUE, from 2004 to 2014, and currently serves on boards including the National Research Council and IESL College of Engineering.

Professor Ratnayake's professional qualifications encompass Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka (1993), Member of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport London (1985), Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences Sri Lanka (2005), and International Professional Engineer (2006). He received the Lions Club International award for outstanding contribution to education in March 2016. His research interests include Transport and Traffic Engineering and Higher Education. Key publications are 'Prioritizing the Road Safety Programme' in the Indian Journal of Transport Management (2003), 'Air Travel Demand Forecasting at the Salt Lake City International Airport' at the IASTED International Conference on Modelling and Simulation (1995), 'Traffic Safety in Sri Lanka' at the 8th Conference of the Road Association of Asia & Australasia (1994), 'Pedestrian Characteristics in Colombo, Sri Lanka' at the 5th World Conference on Transport Research (1989), and 'Estimating Origin-Destination Matrices from Link Volume Counts: A Simple Intercity Auto Travel Demand Model for Sri Lanka' in Transportation Planning and Technology (1988). His leadership has shaped engineering education and transport infrastructure development in Sri Lanka.