Bruce Pitman Named Dean of College of Arts and Sciences

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- E. Bruce Pitman, a noted researcher and professor in the University at Buffalo Department of Mathematics, adjunct professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and associate dean for research and sponsored programs in the College of Arts and Sciences, has been named dean of the college after an internal university search.

Pitman's appointment, which is effective July 1, was announced today by Harvey G. Stenger Jr., interim provost and executive vice president for academic affairs.

Pitman succeeds SUNY Distinguished Professor Bruce D. McCombe, who served as dean of the college since 2007 and recently announced his retirement.

The College of Arts and Sciences is UB's most diverse school. It houses 25 departments in the humanities, arts, social sciences and natural sciences, as well as 14 interdisciplinary programs. More than 15,000 students are enrolled in the college, with approximately 500 faculty members engaged in teaching, service and research.

"I am very pleased to appoint Professor Pitman as the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences," Stenger said. "During Bruce's long tenure at the University at Buffalo, he has proven to be an exemplary scholar and, as associate dean and vice provost, an excellent university administrator.

"He has been integral to the advancement of UB's educational mission through curricular innovation and the support of pedagogical enhancements," Stenger said, "and his transdisciplinary experience, knowledge and appreciation of the incredible academic diversity found in the college make him a wonderful choice to lead UB's largest and most comprehensive school."

"This selection is wonderful news for all of us at UB," said Officer-in-Charge Satish K. Tripathi.

"In important ways, the College of Arts and Sciences is a microcosm of the university at large," Tripathi said, "reflecting, as it does, the breadth and depth of UB's academic strengths, as well as the scope of its impact beyond our university community, and the complex network of partnerships and collaborations that connect us across disciplines and with other institutions and communities, both near and far. I am delighted that a scholar and leader of Bruce's proven expertise and vision will be serving in this critical leadership role."

Pitman said he is honored by the appointment and grateful for the opportunity to serve the college. "It is particularly significant for me, to succeed a terrific dean and a great individual, Bruce McCombe," he said.

"At the same time, knowing the talent and energy of the faculty and staff in CAS, I am humbled by the appointment. I am confident we can get through the current challenges together, and we will continue on a path leading the college and its departments to be among the best in the country."

Pitman holds a bachelor's degree in physics and mathematics from Northwestern University and earned his PhD in mathematics from Duke University in 1985. He held postdoctoral appointments at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University; the Institute for Mathematics and its Applications, University of Minnesota; and the New Jersey Institute of Technology before he joined the UB faculty as assistant professor of mathematics in 1989. He was subsequently promoted to associate and full professor.

His work at UB is marked by outstanding academic research, the development of new and innovative graduate and undergraduate programs, and the establishment of unique educational outreach programs for high school students that offer hands-on experience with applied computer modeling and simulation to solve important problems in math, science, engineering and medicine.

Pitman served as UB's vice provost for educational technology from 2000-03 before being named CAS associate dean for research and sponsored programs in 2003.

He is the author or co-author of more than 60 papers and reports, and has been principal investigator or co-investigator on more than $9 million of research and equipment awards.

He has conducted important research in mathematical biology -- notably renal hemodynamics -- and has received funding from the National Science Foundation for his work on granular materials and, most recently, modeling and computation and analysis of geophysical mass flows.

During his career, he has received funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, has been a panelist for the National Science Foundation, vice chair of the Coalition for Academic Scientific Computing and a co-organizer of the Statistical and Applied Mathematical Science Institute's (SAMSI) Program on Development, Assessment and Utilization of Complex Computer Models in 2006-07.

Pitman developed a graduate certificate in computational science, two new graduate courses in high-performance computing and, with colleagues in the departments of Computer Science and Engineering and Biological Sciences, organized an undergraduate degree and advanced certificate in bioinformatics and computational biology.

As director of graduate studies in the Department of Mathematics from 1997-99, he assisted in the development of a five-year bachelor's/master's combined degree program.

Pitman has taught a variety of undergraduate and graduate courses at UB, ranging from calculus and differential equations to high performance computing, partial differential equations, ordinary differential equations, numerical analysis, statistics, and stochastic or random methods in applied math. In addition, he lectures in UB's graduate ethics course, discussing privacy and security issues related to electronic media.

He is the chair for education and outreach at the Center for Computational Research (CCR). As part of this work, he and the CCR leadership have organized a workshop in computational science for high school students, which has been held annually since 1999.

In 2007, CCR re-named the workshop The Eric Pitman Workshop on Computational Science in memory of Pitman's son, Eric, who passed away that year. The workshop will be held this year from June 27 to July 8. Pitman and his family also established Ripples of Hope: The Eric Scott Pitman Lectures in Ethics and Social Justice at St. Joseph's Collegiate Institute, where Eric was a student.