Volume 3, Issue 1 - Fall 2025
"Highlighting Excellence in Action at the Dietrich School and CGS"
Under New Leadership Team CGS to Expand Online Offerings, Department Partnerships
The College of General Studies is in the midst of a renaissance. Established in the late 1950s, CGS was founded to create programs fitting the unique educational needs of adult learners. CGS started out offering flexible degree-granting options in the liberal arts, business, and education and over time, expanded into interdisciplinary majors, certificates, and continuing education offerings.
Today, CGS serves a broad population of students, including veterans, working professionals, and traditional age undergraduates transferring from other colleges and universities. As the demographics and needs of CGS students have evolved, the College has responded by introducing more online learning opportunities. The importance of online education became starkly relevant during the pandemic, when CGS was a campus leader in transitioning from in-person to remote instruction. Over the past two years, Dean Adam Leibovich has strategically invested in growing the College’s team of instructional designers, enabling CGS to grow its selection of online courses.
The demand for online education is steadily increasing. CGS expanded online course offerings to 232 in AY25 (up from 217 in AY24 and 189 in AY23). There was a 13% increase in enrollment in online courses in AY25 (5,481 in AY25 versus 4,849 in AY24). For Fall 2025, the College is offering a total of 3,352 seats in 112 online classes (a 22% increase in seat capacity compared to Fall 2024). However, enrollment data suggests that demand continues to outpace supply.
The College is taking key steps to best position us to meet this moment. We increased capacity for the current academic year by adding seats to existing online classes, aiming to ensure more students can access the courses they need. And, over the summer, Dean Adam appointed Teaching Associate Professor Klaus Libertus to serve as the inaugural Director for CGS and Assistant Dean for Online Education. Klaus began this new position August 15 and will focus on expanding access to a Pitt education for adult and non-traditional students and accelerating the development and approval of fully online academic programs. He will work closely with the CGS Online team—including CGS’s Director of Online Learning , Boryana Dobreva—and Dietrich School academic units to: increase the availability of online courses that fulfill general education requirements; develop online versions of Dietrich academic programs; and, ensure a high-quality experience for instructors and students.
In his announcement of Klaus’s appointment, Dean Adam said, “I’m excited to have Klaus leading our efforts…his experience in online education development, curriculum design, and faculty collaboration will be key assets in this role. And, as a faculty member with a joint appointment in our Department of Psychology and CGS, he brings great insight into the needs and aspirations of the diverse student population who call CGS home.”
Dean Adam and Executive Director for Administration, Jessica Hatherill, have also been working with the Office of the Provost and other campus partners to secure additional resources for CGS to assist with strategic planning and the scaled, sustainable growth of online programs and courses. In mid-August, Jessica announced that Audra Longert, who’s been serving as Pitt’s Associate Vice Provost for Digital Education, will be supporting the CGS team as they ramp up these efforts.
Audra will serve as the Strategic Advisor for Online Program Development in the Dietrich School and CGS. She will be responsible for developing a strategic plan guiding the scaled growth of CGS’s online programs and courses, working with Klaus and Boryana on implementing a strategic plan, and assisting Dietrich School departments in developing online graduate (Master’s) degree programs. Audra’s time with CGS will be at 40% effort (as the rest of her time will be spent working with SCI).
Says Dean Adam, “We’ve got an incredibly strong team in place. They’re creative, enthusiastic, and supremely qualified to help guide CGS into this new era of possibilities. They’re looking forward to working with faculty across our departments to continue the CGS commitment to innovation and to meeting students where they are, with what they need.”
Associate Deans Continue Departmental Visits Established During Listening Tours
Throughout his career—as chair of the Dietrich School’s Department of Physics and Astronomy, as Associate Dean for Research and Faculty Development, and now as Dean—Adam Leibovich has prioritized communication and transparency. Upon beginning his deanship in the summer of 2023, one of his first initiatives was scheduling a school-wide listening tour of academic departments, interdisciplinary programs, and centers.
As he explained to department chairs and program directors at the time, “While I’ve worked with many of you in my previous administrative capacities, it’s important to me to start this new role with a broader understanding of your priorities, concerns, and hopes for the future.”
The tours provided Dean Adam, his associate deans, and his executive directors with the opportunity to learn more about each unit’s undergraduate and graduate programs; faculty research and scholarship; and both the main areas of focus within each unit, and key collaborations happening beyond the units. The visits led to important conversations and were the driving force behind key changes, including:
- hiring an embedded therapist dedicated to supporting graduate students,
- partnering with UCIS to create a new Director of Dietrich School Global Experiences
- launching the Dietrich Innovation Initiative; and,
- conducting a comprehensive staff review across departments and centers.
Now, Dean Adam is taking another important step in promoting an ongoing conversation between the Dean’s Office and the school’s academic units. This fall, our five Associate Deans will begin scheduling annual visits with all departments and programs.
The Associate Dean visits complement several initiatives already in place to ensure that faculty, staff, and students have access to Dean Adam and remain informed about the priorities of the school and the goals and objectives related to them.
Every month the Dean holds office hours, hosts an update meeting for all department chairs, and, alongside Executive Director of Administration Jessica Hatherill, meets with the three Divisional Chairs for Humanities, Natural Sciences, and Social Sciences. Full faculty meetings are scheduled at least once per term and over the summer, the school invited all faculty and staff to attend an in-person town hall with the Dean—an event so popular that it will be repeated this fall. Last month, a virtual “suggestion box,” was added to the Dietrich School website inviting feedback.
Says Dean Adam, “Everyone here is working toward the same goal—making the Dietrich School a place where our faculty, staff and students can thrive. The Dean’s Team is here to help and the more we know about our people, the better we can do that.”
The opportunity to communicate with school leadership is especially important to faculty and staff during a time when the University is facing internal and external challenges, including controlled hiring, budget reallocations, and a historically large incoming class of first-year students.
Adds Dean Adam, “We won’t always have the answers or the ability to control every situation. But it’s important for us to remain in conversation with people. To show up and let people know that we care. We want to hear their concerns, and if there’s something we can do to help, we’ll do it.”
Staff Advisors, Faculty Mentors Team Up to Provide Comprehensive Student Support
In 2024, Provost and Senior Vice Chancellor Joe McCarthy announced a new shared model of advising for the University’s Pittsburgh campus with the goal of providing more standardized, collaborative, and holistic advising for every student. The centerpiece of the model is a robust collaboration between staff advisors and faculty mentors in every academic department, with each professional playing a unique role in supporting undergraduates once they declare their major. The model is being rolled out in schools across campus with Dietrich School academic units scheduled to begin a phased, multi-year implementation in Fall 2026.
Since the announcement, key faculty and staff at the Dietrich School have been participating in listening sessions, workshops, and other programs to prepare for the transition.
Dean Adam believes that the shared model plays to the strengths of departments’ staff advisors—student services experts with advanced degrees in the field—and faculty members with relevant disciplinary expertise and industry connections.
Several Dietrich School departments—including Anthropology, Biological Sciences, Geology and Environmental Science, Neuroscience, and Studio Arts—already incorporate staff advising.
Says Dean Adam, “Staff advisors are outstanding at working closely with students to craft customized academic plans that not only incorporate the right number of credits and requirements, but that integrate important experiential learning opportunities and activities that flesh out a student’s academic portfolio. Faculty can complement that by offering additional support, including career guidance, assisting with networking, and providing impactful reference letters for graduate school applications and potential employers. It’s the best of both worlds and it’s all about making sure our undergraduates have that foundational support to succeed.”
Adds Dean Adam, “All faculty informally mentor students—in the classroom, during office hours, through experiential learning opportunities—but this new official role of faculty mentor is different. So what we’re working toward is essentially a job description. We believe that something formal that specifies accountability and responsibilities will help promote the same high level of excellence and expectations throughout the school.”
Watch for more updates on the new shared model for advising in the upcoming term.
Excellence in Brief
- This summer Tia-Lynn Ashman, distinguished professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, was awarded the highest honor that the Botanical Society of America bestows on a professional member, the "Distinguished Fellow of the Botanical Society of America."
- Huey Copeland, the Andrew W. Mellon Chair and Professor in the Department of History of Art and Architecture, has been named a 2025/2026 Guest Scholar by the GRI Getty Scholars Program. He will be in residence from January until June 2026 with his work “Thinking the Unthought: From Continental Philosophy to Black Radical Study.”
- Graham Hatfull, Eberly Family Professor of Biotechnology and HHMI Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, has been named a Fellow of the Royal Society, the United Kingdom’s national academy of sciences and an organization of international scholars.
- Six University of Pittsburgh graduates, including five from the Dietrich School, have been selected as 2025-26 Fulbright U.S. Student Program finalists, continuing the University’s tradition of global scholarship and cultural exchange. This year’s recipients will travel to five countries to teach English, pursue advanced degrees and conduct research through one of the United States’ most prestigious international academic exchange programs.
- The U.S. Department of Education has awarded the University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh campus a federal TRIO Student Support Services (SSS) grant totaling $489,444 annually for five years (contingent on continued Congressional approval) to improve college retention and graduation rates among low-income, first-generation students, and students with disabilities.