Carnegie Mellon University, College of Fine Arts
Abstract
The CMU College of Fine Arts team proposes to use this gathering as an opportunity to reach closure on the strategic planning process we have undertaken this academic year. Through reflection, critique, prioritization, rebalancing, and clarification, we plan to leave with a final draft of the document as well as a charge to the schools and units for AY26-27.
More than 125 years after its founding, CMU is still a place where the arts counterbalance the dominant fields of engineering and computer science. Our struggles to amplify and institutionalize our influence, to be a valued partner rather than merely ornamental, drive our strategic priorities. We assert the value of the arts in this fragile and perilous moment. Our five schools—architecture, art, design, drama, and music—have operated with great autonomy, sometimes to the point of isolation. We welcome the opportunity to clarify the foundational principles we hold in common.
Our timeframe is only the next three to five years. The current higher ed landscape is simply changing too fast for us to be able to count on any kind of status quo. While CMU has mostly escaped becoming a particular target of the present administration, we are aware that this could change at any moment, so our most optimistic projections should be cost-neutral. This is a frustrating constraint, as our ambitions are expansive but our footprint is small, with numerous pain points around facilities and technology. It’s clear that the building boom of the past two decades is over. Conversely, opportunities for cross-campus collaboration offer hope that in the next five years we may be able to grow into our potential. As artists we are accustomed to making do, to working around the edges, and this ability to adapt will serve us well.
Meet the Team
Daniel Cardoso Llach is an Associate Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, United States, where he teaches architecture and directs a laboratory critically exploring the role of digital technologies in design. In his work he combines methods from history, design, and science and technology studies to examine the interplay of design and computation, and to develop post-disciplinary approaches to research and pedagogy as critical technical practices. Daniel is the author of, among others, Builders of the Vision (Routledge 2015) and Designing the Computational Image (AR+D 2023, with T. Vardouli). He received an MS and a PhD (as a Presidential Fellow) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States, and a professional BArch from Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá. Since 2025 he serves as Associate Dean for Faculty and Graduate Affairs at the College of Fine Arts, where he leads mentoring initiatives and works to advance graduate studies in the arts.
Pittsburgher Kyle Haden is a director, artistic leader, educator, and actor. During his six-year tenure as Artistic Director of the Ashland New Plays Festival in Oregon, more than a dozen plays developed at the festival went on to premiere nationwide. He also spearheaded the festival’s 2016 Women’s Invitational; one of the winning plays, Martyna Majok’s Cost of Living, won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize. Kyle has directed world premieres and productions across the country, including Parental Advisory: a breakbeat play (Milwaukee Repertory Theater), The Devil is a Lie (Quantum Theatre), and the award-winning Hazardous Materials (Creede Repertory Theatre). He currently serves as Artistic Producer of ColLABo, a production development incubator at CMU’s Center for New Work Development. As an actor, he has performed at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Guthrie Theater, and Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and won the 2024 Berkshire Theatre Critics Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor for Primary Trust. He is Associate Professor of Acting and Senior Associate Head of the School of Drama at CMU.
Mary Ellen Poole has been Dean of the College of Fine Arts at Carnegie Mellon University since 2021. Prior to CMU she served for seven years as Director of the Butler School of Music at the University of Texas at Austin, and from 2003-2014 as Dean of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Her proudest accomplishment in all three positions has been the hiring of brilliant leadership, faculty, and staff who bring their strong and diverse voices to the current urgent conversation about the power of artists and art making in these times. As a musicologist, her research, publications, and presentations 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. A native of Louisiana, she holds a Ph.D. in musicology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Jenn Joy Wilson is Associate Dean for Research and Creative Practice in the College of Fine Arts at Carnegie Mellon University. A research development professional with more than twenty years of experience in arts organizations and universities, she advances values-aligned research and creative practice across disciplines. Wilson partners with college leadership, faculty, and university offices to strengthen proposal development, build collaborative networks, and expand funding opportunities for arts-based research. Her initiatives focus on increasing grant-writing capacity, fostering interdisciplinary partnerships, and integrating emerging areas such as the arts and artificial intelligence into the research ecosystem. At institutional and national levels, she contributes to initiatives addressing research policy, systems, and the role of the arts and humanities within R1 research environments. Through engagement with organizations such as the Alliance for the Arts in Research Universities and the National Organization of Research Development Professionals, she connects CMU’s work to the broader conversation worldwide.
