Dr. MaryTheresa Seig Named Dean of the College of Arts, Education and Humanities

Dr. MaryTheresa Seig has been named Dean of the College of Arts, Education and Humanities, at Bemidji State University.

Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Allen Bedford said Seig’s vast experience make her well poised to lead the variety of departments she will oversee at BSU.

“With her academic training and scholarship in English, linguistics, discourse analysis and intercultural communication, as well as her experience managing a complex set of programs in various countries, Dr. Seig is positioned well to lead the College of Arts, Education and Humanities both at this time in which our methods of instruction are evolving due to the coronavirus pandemic and as BSU continues its strategic commitments to advance multicultural understanding,” he said. “I am thrilled that Dean Seig is joining the BSU team.”

Prior to her appointment at Bemidji State, Seig served as a professor of English in applied linguistics at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana where she has been a member of the faculty or administration since 2001. She spent six years building and delivering an intensive English program in Bagdad, Iraq and from 2017-2019 served as Ball State’s executive director for global initiatives, the university’s senior international officer.

“I look forward to collaborating on various initiatives that are already in the works and to envisioning with the faculty and staff new directions and new adventures,” she said.

As the executive director of the Intensive English Institute from 2006 to 2019, Seig grew a pilot program of ten graduate assistants and 35 enrolled international students to a robust program with 26 full-time faculty members and 385 international students. During her tenure, she was also successful in obtaining $3.7 million in external funding to support professional development, university partnerships and language learning.

Seig holds a baccalaureate degree in linguistics from the University of Oklahoma in Norman, a masters in teaching English to speakers of other languages from Michigan State University in East Lansing and a doctorate in English and linguistics from Oklahoma State University in Stillwater.

Her appointment at Bemidji State will begin on August 1.

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2020-B-195