Loren Crabtree joined the administration at UT in 2001 as provost and vice president. When the office of chancellor was reinstated, he was named chancellor (July 1, 2003) and served until January 2008. Well respected by faculty and students, he differed in substantive ways with President John Petersen about governance issues and UT system responsibilities as related to the Knoxville campus. He resigned abruptly at Petersen’s request following a scheduled conference on January 3, 2008. In 2008–9 he served as senior fellow and chief executive for Global Education for the Institute for Shipboard Education, the 501C3 organization that administers the Semester at Sea global study-abroad program, an organization with which he had been associated since fall 1986.
He earned the bachelor’s, master’s and PhD degrees from the University of Minnesota (1961, 1965, and 1969, respectively). He served on the faculty of Bethel College (Minnesota) and joined the faculty at Colorado State University in 1967. He served Colorado State as dean of the College of Liberal Arts (1991–97) and provost and vice president for academic affairs (1997–2001).