Dean's Office Directory
Dean & Associate Deans
William G. Thomas III is the dean of the College of Letters and Science. Prior to joining Montana State University in 2025, he was the associate dean for research and graduate education in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where from 2005 to 2025 he held the Angle Chair in the Humanities and was a professor of history and a fellow of the Center for Digital Research in the Humanities. He served as chair of the University of Nebraska's history department from 2010 to 2016. Thomas specializes in U.S. history and among other honors has been named a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow and a Lincoln Prize Finalist. He is the author of A Question of Freedom: The Families Who Challenged Slavery from the Nation's Founding to the Civil War, which received the 2021 Mark Lynton History Prize and the 2021 Society for Historians of the Early Republic Book Prize. Thomas co-founded and directed the Virginia Center for Digital History at the University of Virginia, where he was an assistant and associate professor of history, and a co-editor of the award-winning Valley of the Shadow: Two Communities in the American Civil War. His research has been supported with grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Science Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies and the Mellon Foundation. In 2023, he was elected vice president of the American Historical Association, and in that role leads the research and scholarship division. Thomas is a graduate of Trinity College (Connecticut) and currently serves on the Trinity College Board of Trustees. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in history from the University of Virginia.
David Cherry
Associate Dean for Student Success and Curriculum
Dr. Cherry is a history professor whose research focuses on Roman North Africa and the history of the Roman frontiers. In addition to numerous peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, he has published two books, Frontier and Society in Roman North Africa, published by Oxford University Press in 1998, and The Roman World: A Sourcebook, published by Blackwell in 2001. In addition to his excellent scholarship and work in the classroom, Dr. Cherry has served in numerous leadership positions at MSU. He was actively involved in the development of MSU’s current core curriculum. He was instrumental in the creation of both the Liberal Studies and American Studies programs, serving as director of Liberal Studies from 2005 to 2009 and director of American Studies from 2009 to 2014. He’s been very involved in the University Library Committee, acting as that group’s chair from 1995 to 2003 and again from 2013 to present. For many years, Dr. Cherry served on the advisory committee for the college’s first-year seminar course, and was the chair of the Department of History and Philosophy from 2011 to 2014. He was the department’s graduate program coordinator from 1998 to 2004. Before coming to MSU in 1992, Dr. Cherry taught at the University of Toronto, Stanford University, and the University of Puget Sound. He earned his doctorate in Classics from the University of Ottawa.
Michelle Miley
Associate Dean for Faculty and College Affairs
Dr. Michelle Miley, the Director of the MSU Writing Center and Associate Professor in English, came to MSU in 2013. She holds a Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition from the University of Houston where she served for eight years as the Assistant Director of Writing in the Disciplines. Dr. Miley continues to be research active and has been published in such venues as The Writing Center Journal, WLN: A Journal for Writing Center Scholarship, and Praxis. Her work has been included in edited collections such as The Writing Studio Sampler and Theories and Methods of Writing Center Studies. For the past four years Dr. Miley has collaborated with faculty across MSU to integrate writing into STEM and to develop models of writing support for student writers. She has also served the College in several capacities, presently as a member of the CLS Diversity, Equity and Inclusion committee. Dr. Miley’s work has focused on creating and supporting multidisciplinary, collaborative environments within the institution and she will have many new opportunities to serve and support the CLS community as the Associate Dean beginning January 1, 2022.
Staff
Kala Radovich
Assistant to the Dean
