New this year at Pitt-Bradford

People

Pitt-Bradford has four new head coaches: Doug Alban, men's and women's swimming; Zach Foster, baseball; Marquis Walker, women's soccer; and Nathan Whitehurst, men's soccer.

Alban takes the place of beloved swim coach Ed Bahan, who died unexpectedly during the 2015-16 season. He arrives after serving five years as an assistant swimming and diving coach at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tenn.

Bradford native Foster is a former star pitcher for the Panthers from 2005-08. He was the first Pitt-Bradford player drafted to play professional baseball.

Walker's resume spans several levels of soccer, including seven seasons as head coach at Division II Malone University in Canton, Ohio.

The new men's head soccer coach, Nathan Whitehurst, comes from Allegheny College, where he had served as an assistant coach since 2012.

Jonathan Chitiyo has been appointed assistant professor of education. He earned his master's degree from Southern Illinois University and his bachelor's degree from Africa University in Zimbabwe.

Douglas Graham is instructor of athletic training and clinical coordinator. He received his bachelor's degree in athletic training from Alfred University and his Master of Science in sport administration from Canisius College. He most recently served as the head athletic trainer for the Rochester Rhinos, a professional soccer team.

Dr. Rebecca McHugh is assistant professor of developmental psychology. She joins Pitt-Bradford from Russellville, Ark., and has extensive teaching experience from Arkansas Tech University, the Community College of Allegheny County and the University of Pittsburgh. She earned her master's and doctoral degrees from Pitt.

Zachary Stark is an instructor of exercise science. He has taught at Bradford Area High School for the last 12 years. Stark has taught for the College in the High School program, and he received his Master of Science degree in exercise science from California University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Sushan Zhao is assistant professor of computer information systems and technology. He earned his doctorate in computer science from the University of Windsor in Canada. Most recently, he has been a lecturer at Bishop's University and Vanier College in Canada. He also has rich experience in the telecommunication and software industry, having worked as a software developer at VMWare, Mitel, Ericsson and Nuance in Finland and Canada.

Also, Sofia Brien was named the new Manager of Human Resources. Previously, she served as human resources and payroll assistant and owned Pizza Napoli from 1998 until 2015.

 

Places

New places on the Pitt-Bradford campus include a new Starbucks café inside the Hanley Library and a Systems, Networks and Projects (SNAP) computer lab in the Hangar Building. The new computer lab will help computer information systems and technology students simulate the server setup of a small business.

In addition, the entire campus has been named a Tree Campus USA by the National Arbor Day Foundation for its commitment to effective campus tree management.

 

Things

Computer information science and technology majors at Pitt-Bradford can also pursue one or more of three new concentrations: cyber security and digital forensics, application software development or systems and network administration. Students who are pursuing other majors can add prerequisite courses to each concentration for a minor.

Three other minors are now available to students as well: cinema studies, Africana studies, and gender, sexuality and women's studies.