Michael Brumbaugh

As senior associate dean for academic affairs at Newcomb-Tulane College, Michael Brumbaugh leads the college’s academic portfolio in partnership with faculty across Tulane’s five undergraduate schools. His work centers on building the structures and incentives that support faculty in doing their most creative and ambitious work, in service of an undergraduate education that is challenging, cohesive and transformative.

He oversees the NTC Core Curriculum, including first-year seminars, as well as the academic policies and standards that shape the undergraduate experience. His portfolio also includes academic integrity, summer school and special programs for the college’s most academically ambitious students, including the honors thesis, undergraduate research and competitive fellowships. He supports many of the college’s faculty governance committees and designs course-development initiatives, such as Duren "dream courses" that encourage faculty to experiment, take intellectual risks and bring bold new ideas to their teaching.

Michael is an associate professor in the Department of Classical Studies and a member of the core faculty of the Stone Center for Latin American Studies. His research focuses on classical philology, ancient Mediterranean political thought and its reception in colonial Latin America, and he is the author of two scholarly books. He teaches ancient Greek and Latin, Hellenistic poetry and colonial Latin American intellectual history. He has also taught first-year seminars on restorative justice in ancient Athens and modern New Orleans, as well as a service-learning course on ancient Greek drama as a form of storytelling, communal therapy and reintegration for combat veterans.

Raised on a farm in rural Oregon, Michael traveled across the country to attend Colgate University, where he earned his AB before completing his MA and PhD at UCLA. Prior to joining Tulane in 2013, he taught at Princeton, Reed College and UCLA. Read more about his teaching and research on his faculty page.