Dean Wendy Sternberg
Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the College

Wendy Sternberg has served as the vice president for academic affairs and dean of the college at Occidental since 2017. Prior to joining Oxy’s Dean’s Office, she served as the Dean of Academic Departments and Programs at Union College (N.Y.), her alma mater, and as the Associate Provost at Haverford College. After her undergraduate career at Union, Sternberg received her PhD in Behavioral Neuroscience in UCLA’s Psychology Department in 1994. Her research program on the psychobiological underpinnings of pain served as a training ground for hundreds of undergraduate students and contributed important conceptual findings to the literature. Her research investigated sources of variability in pain behaviors related to environmental enrichment, social interactions, sex and gonadal hormones, early life experience, stress, and genetic influences. She taught for 18 years in the Haverford Psychology Department, contributing introductory and advanced courses in Biological Psychology, Pain, Stress, Statistics, and Research Methods.