Announcing New Dean of the College of Fine Arts

Dear Members of the Carnegie Mellon University Community:

I am pleased to announce that following an extensive search, Mary Ellen Poole, Ph.D., will serve as the new Stanley and Marcia Gumberg Dean of the College of Fine Arts (CFA). She also will hold a faculty appointment as professor of music. Dr. Poole will begin her tenure at CMU on August 1.

Dr. Poole is a well-regarded musicologist who currently serves as director of the Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music in the College of Fine Arts at The University of Texas at Austin, a post she has held since June 2014. She also holds a faculty position as the Florence Thelma Hall Centennial Chair in Music and professor of musicology.

Under Dr. Poole’s leadership, the Butler School of Music attracted world-renowned faculty; expanded its donor base and funded facility updates; and led and facilitated community conversations promoting diversity, equity and inclusion. Throughout her career she consistently advocated for increased performance opportunities for student ensembles.

Prior to her post at Butler, Dr. Poole served as dean of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music for a decade. There, she increased enrollment, recruited exceptional faculty and supervised construction of an $80 million facility in the city’s arts district. As a musicologist, her research has focused on fin-de-siècle Paris: cabaret chansons and chansonniers, music as political propaganda during the Radical Republic and the ideology of teaching music to the working class.

I thank the members of the search advisory committee and, in particular, Cindy Limauro, University Professor of Lighting Design, and Vivian Loftness, University Professor of Architecture, for serving as co-chairs. They led a cross-sectional committee of CFA faculty, staff and students, all of whom went to extraordinary lengths to identify and select CFA’s new dean — despite challenges faced while conducting a search during a pandemic.

On behalf of the entire university community, I also extend my gratitude to CFA Dean Dan Martin for his leadership for more than 11 years. His dedication highlighted and celebrated the impactful work of the remarkably diverse and high-ranking programs housed within CFA. I am grateful for his support in ensuring a smooth transition and I look forward to his continued contributions to CMU as a faculty member.

Please join me in congratulating Dr. Poole and welcoming her to the Carnegie Mellon University family.

Sincerely,

Jim Garrett
Provost