Michael Hildreth became vice president and associate provost for graduate studies and dean of the Graduate School on July 1, 2023.
As dean of the Graduate School, he oversees the master’s and doctoral programs within engineering, global affairs, the humanities, the sciences, business (doctoral), and the social sciences, is responsible for graduate policies and procedures, and provides services, support, and resources for graduate students in the areas of recruitment and admissions, professional development, wellness, community, financial support, and degree completion. He also oversees the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs and the Moreau Faculty Development Program, and works closely with the vice president for research and the associate deans for graduate education from the University’s colleges and schools.
Hildreth came to Notre Dame in 2000 as a member of the Department of Physics. He served for 6 years (2016-2021, 2022-2023) as associate dean for research and graduate studies in the College of Science, and one year (2021) as interim dean of the College of Science. Among his other university leadership roles, he led the university core curriculum committee and oversaw general education at the university from 2015-2023.
For more than two decades, Hildreth has led particle physics projects focusing on technical upgrades and software infrastructure. He is widely recognized for contributions to particle physics, its software infrastructure, and the technology and policies of open data, and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society. His current research focuses on searches for new physics processes at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. He also works on Open Science and FAIR Data principles. He is very active in service to his profession, including recent membership on the national High Energy Physics Advisory Panel (HEPAP) and the NSF Advisory Committee on Cyber Infrastructure (ACCI). He has co-authored over 1700 publications, and has received numerous awards for his teaching and research, including a DOE Outstanding Junior Investigator and Cottrell Scholar awards. At Notre Dame, he has received the Rev. Edmund P. Joyce, C.S.C., the Thomas P. Madden, and the Shilts-Leonard awards for teaching.