Montalto to Serve as Director of University Orientation and First Year Experience

Dear Colleagues:

Catherine P. Montalto, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Human Sciences, has accepted our offer to serve as director of University Orientation and First Year Experience (UOFYE) and faculty fellow in the Office of Undergraduate Education.  Her appointment is effective January 1, 2018.

In these roles, Dr. Montalto will lead and coordinate efforts and activities to support and enhance our students’ academic success, particularly as they begin their educational journey at The Ohio State University.

Dr. Montalto joined Ohio State’s faculty in 1992 and has taught undergraduate and graduate students at all levels.  Her research areas include family economics, college student debt and decision making, and her current research focus is college students’ financial wellness.

As a consumer economist, Dr. Montalto studies factors and processes affecting the economic status and financial security of households and individual household members. Her work has appeared in numerous peer-reviewed journals including the Journal of Economic Psychology, Financial Services Review, Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Journal of Youth Studies, Journal of Financial Therapy, and Journal of College Student Retention.

Dr. Montalto has worked with Dr. Anne McDaniel, executive director of the Center for the Study of Student Life in Ohio State’s Office of Student Life, to administer the national Study on Collegiate Financial Wellness. The goal is to understand how financial wellness affects the college experience and academic and career success. The results of this continuing research will inform initiatives and interventions launched by colleges, universities, state governments, and federal government agencies in their efforts to assist current and future students achieve financial and personal success.

Her service to her department and college is extensive.  In addition, she has served on the Graduate School Curriculum Committee and currently serves as co-chair of the university’s General Education Review Committee.  Among her many honors, for her exceptional university-wide service she was selected to receive a 2015 President and Provost’s Award for Distinguished Faculty Service.

She earned a BS and MS from The Ohio State University and a PhD in consumer economics from Cornell University.

Please join me in congratulating Cathy. I look forward to working with her in her new position.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth (Beth) Hume, PhD
Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies
Dean of Undergraduate Education
Professor of Linguistics