White joined the Georgia Tech faculty in 1975. He was appointed the Eugene C. Gwaltney Professor of Manufacturing and named a Regents’ Professor in Industrial and Systems Engineering before he was “loaned” to the National Science Foundation for three years to lead its engineering directorate. He was appointed dean of the College in 1991 and served in that role until he returned to his undergraduate alma mater, the University of Arkansas, to be its chancellor in 1997.

White established the College of Engineering Alumni Awards in 1994 and was presented the Dean’s Appreciation Award at the event in 2023. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1987 for “the creative development of engineering principles and computational procedures used in the design and analysis of material handling systems.”