Campus News
UCSC Vice Provost and Dean Peter Biehl to join UC Irvine
Since joining UC Santa Cruz in 2021, Biehl has led the Graduate Division’s approach to graduate education, spanning recruitment, admissions, mentoring, student success, professional and career development, and alumni engagement.
Dear Campus Community,
Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Peter Biehl has accepted the role of Vice Provost for Graduate Education and Dean of the Graduate Division at the University of California, Irvine. He will conclude his service at UC Santa Cruz at the end of the spring quarter.
Since joining UC Santa Cruz in 2021, Biehl has led the Graduate Division’s approach to graduate education, spanning recruitment, admissions, mentoring, student success, professional and career development, and alumni engagement. He launched the campus Implementation Task Force for Inclusive Excellence in Graduate Education, which took a comprehensive, campuswide look at graduate education and student support and developed a new 5/2-year doctoral and MFA student funding model grounded in student success, well-being, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. Its recommendations were incorporated into Leading the Change: The UC Santa Cruz Strategic Plan under the initiative Envisioning Graduate Education for the Future.
Biehl has worked closely with faculty, staff, and graduate students to strengthen graduate programs and advance policies that support student progress. He has also been an engaged partner to deans, department leadership, and campus units. A first-generation college student himself, he has made expanding access to graduate education his guiding principle. With the Graduate Student Association, he launched the Difficult Conversations Series, covering topics from affordable housing and basic needs to belonging and wellness of international and first-gen students.
At the systemwide level, as convener of the UC Council of Graduate Deans and a representative to the UC Academic Senate’s Coordinating Committee on Graduate Affairs, he helped strengthen UC-wide efforts to address issues related to labor relations, federal funding, and legislative advocacy for graduate education and research.
Beyond UC, he serves as founding chair of the graduate deans group of the Alliance for Hispanic-Serving Research Universities as well as on its advisory council and postdoc advisory committee. Biehl also spearheaded the partnership with San Jose State University in launching a Joint PhD Program in Marine and Coastal Sciences and started work on a second program in Wildfire Science.
During his tenure in the Graduate Division, Peter has completed a new book with UCLA Cotsen Press titled The End of Catalhoyuk: The West Mound Excavation, and an article in Science titled Female lineages and changing kingship patterns in Neolithic Catalhoyuk.
We are grateful for Peter’s service to UC Santa Cruz and for the care and thoughtfulness he has brought to this work. Please join me in congratulating him on this next step and wishing him continued success. We are pleased he will remain a colleague within the University of California.
We will share additional information about interim leadership and next steps for the division in the coming weeks.
Sincerely,
Paul
Paul Koch
Interim Campus Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor