Academic Affairs

Dear Campus Community:

Thomas Albrecht will serve as interim dean of the School of Fine & Performing Arts, and Amy Papaelias will serve as interim associate dean, while Dean Jeni Mokren is on sabbatical leave during the fall 2026 semester. The appointments are effective Aug. 1.

Thomas Albrecht has served as associate dean in the School of Fine & Performing Arts since 2016. He holds the rank of professor in the Department of Art, which he chaired from 2020-24. He continues to serve as the School’s director of art education, leveraging his expertise in first-year studies in the visual arts to implement innovative approaches to drawing curriculum and contemporary art theory. His performance art projects explore ritual and language, and he has performed and exhibited widely throughout the United States and internationally. His work can be viewed at thomasalbrecht.com.

Outside of SUNY New Paltz, Albrecht has contributed to developing writing programs for adult learners at Brown University, has worked with incarcerated learners with the Bard Prison Initiative, taught in the graduate program at Teachers College, Columbia University, and served as the 2017-18 Georgette and Richard Koopman Distinguished Chair in the Visual Arts at the Hartford Art School. Albrecht received his BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, a Master of Arts in Religion from Yale University, and his MFA from the University of Washington. He joined the SUNY New Paltz faculty in 2008.

Amy Papaelias ’05g (Studio Art) joined the faculty of the School of Fine & Performing Arts in 2010 and was awarded continuing appointment as an associate professor of graphic design in 2017. She has been a core member of the Department of Design since it was founded in 2023.

Her career at New Paltz has been marked by deep contributions to programs that enrich the student experience: She is the faculty adviser for Design Society, a lead organizer for major events like the annual New Paltz Design Week and the spring semester Design Show, and the 2016 winner of the Research, Scholarship & Creative Activities program’s Faculty Mentor of the Year award.

Papaelias is the editor of “Alphabettes Soup: Feminist Approaches To Type,” (Bikini Books, 2026), a celebration of feminist approaches to type research, design and creative community-building, and co-lead on “What Scholarship Looks Like,” an ongoing collaborative research project with Jessica Barness on the design of academic journals.

Please join me in thanking Thomas Albrecht and Amy Papaelias for their service to SUNY New Paltz.

Sincerely,

William McClure
Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs