Our People
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USC, Class of 2026, J.D., Juris Doctorate
Pepperdine, Class of 2025, Philosophy & Psychology
LMU, Class of 2025, M.A. Philosophy
Pepperdine, Class of 2026, Screen Arts
USC, Class of 2026, J.D., Law
Pepperdine, Class of 2026, Philosophy
USC, Class of 2025, Classics
Pepperdine, Class of 2025, Economics and Philosophy, Great Books Minor
USC, Class of 2029, Ph.D. Philosophy
Colburn Conservatory of Music, Class of 2025, Violin Performance
USC, Class of 2027, Biological Science
USC, Class of 2024,The Coastlander, Editor-in-Chief
Pepperdine, Class of 2026, Business Administration
Pepperdine, class of 2026, Chemistry
USC, Class of 2025, Computer Science
Pepperdine, Class of 2025, Political Science
USC, Class of 2028, Ph.D. Creative Writing & Literature
Pepperdine, Class of 2026, Physics
USC, Class of 2025, The Coastlander, Editor-in-Chief
USC, Class of 2027, Quantitative Biology
Pepperdine, Class of 2026, Integrated Marketing & Communications, Great Books Minor
Pepperdine, Class of 2025, Philosophy, Great Books Minor
David Albertson (PhD, University of Chicago) is Associate Professor of Religion at USC. He is the author of Cusanus Today: Thinking Between Philosophy and Theology with Nicholas of Cusa (CUA, 2024), Mathematical Theologies: Nicholas of Cusa and the Legacy of Thierry of Chartres (Oxford, 2014), and Without Nature? A New Condition for Theology, with Cabell King (Fordham, 2009), as well as several articles on medieval and Renaissance Christian mysticism, theology, and philosophy. Albertson’s research has been supported by a Fulbright Fellowship, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. He contributes to Commonweal and America Magazine.
Jason Blakely (PhD, UC Berkeley) specializes in political philosophy, the history of political thought, and the human sciences. His most recent book is Lost in Ideology: Interpreting Modern Political Life (Agenda, 2024). Other books include We Built Reality (Oxford, 2020), which received accolades from Charles Taylor and David Bentley Hart; and Interpretive Social Science, with Mark Bevir (Oxford, 2018), which provides a comprehensive guide for social scientists for avoiding scientism and affirming human agency. Blakely is a leading scholar of contemporary “communitarian” and post-liberal thought, especially the work of Alasdair MacIntyre and Charles Taylor, the subject of his first book, Alasdair MacIntyre, Charles Taylor and the Demise of Naturalism (Notre Dame, 2016). In addition to academic writing, he also publishes in Harper’s Magazine, The Atlantic, Commonweal, America Magazine, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and The Washington Post.
Father Luke Dysinger, O.S.B. (PhD, Oxford University; MD, USC) is Professor of Church History and Moral Theology at St. John’s Seminary. After studying medicine at USC, he joined the Benedictine community of Saint Andrew’s Abbey. A patristics scholar, Fr. Dysinger is the author of Psalmody and Prayer in the Writings of Evagrius Ponticus (Oxford, 2005), and a co-translator of Evagrius of Pontus: The Gnostic Trilogy (Oxford, 2023) and also teaches on moral theology and biomedical ethics in different venues. He is a fellow of the Loyola Marymount Bioethics Institute and chairman of the Bioethics Committee at the Antelope Valley Hospital Medical Center, where he serves on the medical staff.
Mary Ortiz (PhD, New York University) is an independent consultant based in Los Angeles with over three decades of experience in Catholic secondary and higher education. After degrees in English and German at Bowdoin College, Dr. Ortiz obtained her doctorate at NYU in eighteenth-century English literature, where she also taught undergraduate writing. For many years she directed programs for high school and college women at the Rosemoor Foundation in New York, and most recently served for eleven years as Head of School at Oakcrest School in Virginia. Dr. Ortiz is an avid reader and is passionate about the power of literature in the formation of young adults.
Stefano Rebeggiani (PhD, La Sapienza, Rome) is Associate Professor of Classics at USC. After studies in Rome, Pisa, and Cambridge University he held a position at NYU before arriving at USC. Rebeggiani studies Roman literature and culture, particularly epic poetry in imperial Rome, as well as Roman art and archaeology. In addition to articles on Statius, Virgil, and Lucretius, he is the author of The Fragility of Power: Statius, Domitian and the Politics of the Thebaid (Oxford, 2018). His next project will study Virgil’s Aeneid and its interaction with the history of the Roman Republic.
Leigh Plunkett Tost (PhD, Duke University) is Associate Professor in the Management and Organization Department at USC Marshall School of Business, where she also serves as Vice Dean of MBA Programs. Tost teaches courses on leadership, teams, and negotiations. Her research on the psychological and sociological dynamics of leadership, diversity, and legitimacy in organizations has been published in Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, Psychological Science, Journal of Applied Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decisions Processes, Reasearch in Organizational Behavior, and Personality and Social Psychology Review. Tost’s research has been discussed in the New York Times, Washington Post, Financial Times, Forbes, and Harvard Business Review. She previously held appointments at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business and the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business.