Rick Dammers is the Dean of the College of the Arts at Rowan University. Rick joined the Music Education faculty at Rowan in 2006 and served as Chair of the Music Department from 2011-2017, during which time the music department grew in student enrollment, faculty size, and external funding. Since becoming Dean, he has helped create the Rowan Arts Engine (a 501c3 art incubator designed to support the regional arts ecosystem), initiated the creation of the Pride of the Profs Marching Band, guided the construction of the Wilson Hall Dance Studios, and facilitated the partnership with the Pig Iron Theatre to include the MFA in Devised Performance at Rowan.  

He is the co-author of the book Practical Music Education Technology, and the author of the technology chapter in the Oxford Handbook of Preservice Music Teacher Education in the United States. His research interests include technology in music education,  artificial intelligence in arts education, and he co-facilitates the NAMM funded TI:ME Music Technology Leadership Academy, a national program for undergraduate and graduate music education students. He is active in supporting the arts in New Jersey by serving on the boards for ArtPride, ArtsEd NJ, and Symphony in C.

Before teaching at Rowan, Rick was a music teacher (band and technology) and the Fine Arts Facilitator in the Ladue School District in suburban St. Louis for 13 years.  He earned a Bachelor of Music Education from Northwestern University; and a Masters and PhD in Music Education from the University of Illinois.  He is a member of Phi Mu Alpha, Phi Beta Mu, and is an honorary Friends of the Arts member of Sigma Alpha Iota.