As the new academic year moves into full swing, Catholic University students are studying under the guidance of a number of impressive faculty members recently hired by the University. Across campus, nearly 20 new faculty members have joined the faculties of their respective schools and colleges.
A few highlights demonstrate the diversity of hiring, which includes tenured faculty from other universities, faculty hired into endowed positions, and one school that successfully attracted a large number of faculty in a very competitive hiring market.
Catholic Law continues impressive hiring record
The Columbus School of Law (Catholic Law) welcomed two senior, tenured faculty who previously held appointments at other universities.
Professor Adam MacLeod joins Catholic Law from St. Mary's University School of Law, where he served as professor of law and the Katherine A. Ryan Chair for Global, Comparative, and International Law. In addition to his faculty appointment at Catholic Law, MacLeod will serve as the Matthew Hale Faculty Fellow with the school’s Center for Law and the Human Person.
MacLeod is joined by his new colleague Professor Seth Oranburg, who will serve as co-director of the Law and Entrepreneurship Program, in addition to his faculty appointment. Oranburg comes to Catholic Law from The University of New Hampshire Franklin Pierce School of Law, where he served as professor of law.
Commenting on MacLeod and Oranburg, Catholic Law dean Stephen Payne noted, “Their expertise is already strengthening our curriculum, enriching our intellectual community, and advancing several of the Law School’s strategic priorities.”
A newly-endowed chair in theology
At the School of Theology and Religious Studies, Father José Noriega begins his appointment as the Blessed McGivney Chair in Theology, a newly-endowed faculty position created to examine family and moral theology. Support for the new chair’s endowment came from the Knights of Columbus, with leadership from Knights of Columbus supreme knight and Catholic University trustee Patrick Kelly.
“The McGivney chair enables the School of Theology and Religious Studies to build on its strengths in moral theology and helps to advance our collaboration with the John Paul II Center,” notes Bradley Gregory, interim dean of the school. “With his track record of scholarship on marriage and family and his teaching experience in America, Rome, and Spain, Fr. Noriega is the ideal scholar to occupy this chair.”
Nursing school meets growing student demand with new hires
The largest number of new hires is in the Conway School of Nursing, which added seven members to its faculty. Demand for nursing professors and educators is high across the country and competition for them is very strong, so the Conway School’s success in hiring them is quite an achievement.
One of the newly hired faculty members, Jessica Granger, Ph.D., M.S.N-Ed, RN, will focus on teaching in the school’s new Accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing program, a 12-month accelerated BSN program designed for students who have a non-nursing bachelor’s degree and want to transition into the nursing profession.
School of philosophy gains new faculty
The School of Philosophy also had a successful year hiring new faculty, as they were able to bring Associate Professor Garrett Smith to the University as a tenured faculty member. Smith is an expert in medieval philosophy, especially the Franciscan tradition.
“Garrett Smith came to us from the University of Bonn, where he held a permanent faculty position for the past six years,” said Bradley Lewis, dean of the School of Philosophy. “He is already a highly accomplished editor of medieval texts with a fine international reputation. His appointment reinforces our status as one of the most important centers for the study of medieval philosophy anywhere.”
The Busch School of Business and the College of Arts and Sciences also hired new faculty members, both tenure-track and clinical/contract, augmenting their faculties and expanding the range of classes and field specializations that they can offer their students.
