Zorica Pantić received her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Niš, Yugoslavia, in 1975, 1978, and 1982, respectively. She has 30 years of academic and teaching experience. She served on the engineering faculty of the University of Nis, San Francisco State University , and the University of Texas at San Antonio. She was a Fulbright Fellow and a Visiting Scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 1984-1989.
As the engineering dean at UTSA, she spearheaded the College of Engineering's and UTSA's efforts to become a flagship university in the state of Texas and a top-tier research university in the U.S. During her tenure, the college started three new Ph.D. engineering programs and one M.S. program. The college created a new Department of Biomedical Engineering and a Center for Response and Security Engineering and Technology, doubled the number of faculty, and increased its research funding tenfold to $7 million in active grants. Pantić also secured $2.5 million in federal funding to establish a Material Science and Engineering Laboratory at the former Kelly Air Force Base. Through strategic partnerships with various state and national agencies, national companies and small businesses, she raised more than $5 million in various donations and equipment grants. She revived relationships with engineering alumni and was instrumental in securing a $250,000 endowment donation, the single largest alumni gift to the college and UTSA. In her last four years, the college increased its enrollment by 75%, being especially effective in attracting female students and minorities.
At San Francisco State University
While at SFSU, Pantić improved the engineering programs in quality, size and visibility, and, as a result—for the first time in SFSU history – the programs were ranked among the top 50 undergraduate programs by U.S. News & World Report. She established a Partnership for Engineering Education that resulted in a 30 percent enrollment increase and played a crucial role in shaping and bringing to life a partnership with a neighboring community college to offer upper-division engineering courses there. This project serves as a blueprint for cooperation between the 23-campus California State University system, of which San Francisco State is a member, and California's community colleges. Through a partnership with the local chapter of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and a major grant from the National Science Foundation, she established a Center for Applied Electromagnetics that supports undergraduate and graduate research. Pantić was active in state-level fundraising for engineering programs. She worked with fellow CSU Engineering deans on the successful $10-million California Workforce Initiative to support strategic disciplines such as agriculture, biotechnology, computer science, engineering, and nursing. She also served on the Executive Committee of the Texas Engineering and Technology Consortium, a private-public partnership that raised $8 million to increase the number of engineering and computer science graduates in the state of Texas.
Pantić's appointment as Wentworth Institute of Technology's fourth president was announced on June 8, 2005. She took office August 1, 2005 and was the first female engineer to head an institute of technology in the United States. She was formally installed as president of Wentworth on April 5, 2006. Pantić retired as President of Wentworth on May 31, 2019, after 14 years at its helm. During her tenure as its President, she has shaped Wentworth into the university it is known as today, as well as dramatically increased its position in the region and its national standings.
