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CORVALLIS, Ore. – Two new administrators have been appointed in the College of Forestry at Oregon State University.

Steve Tesch, a professor of silviculture in the OSU Department of Forest Engineering, Resources and Management, has been named executive associate dean. Brenda McComb, an associate dean for natural resources at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, has been named head of the Department of Forest Ecosystems and Society.

Tesch, who came to OSU from the University of Montana in 1981, has more than 30 years of experience as an academic leader, teacher, scientist, and outreach educator. He succeeds Stephen Hobbs, who retired last month after 30 years of service to the university.

Tesch was head of the forest engineering department at OSU for 12 years, served as a co-principal investigator for the college’s Center for Wood Utilization Research, and as the program manager for the Forest Research Laboratory’s Fish and Wildlife Habitat in Managed Forests Research program. He has also received the College of Forestry’s Aufderheide Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Tesch “has a broad vision for all the programs of our college, and the external relationships to help us with our private giving goals to support those programs,” said Hal Salwasser, dean of the college.

McComb will succeed W. Thomas Adams, interim department head and former head of the forest science department, who is retiring after 30 years at OSU. She will assume her new position on April 15.

McComb, an expert in natural resources conservation and wildlife management, was the associate dean for research and outreach at Massachusetts-Amherst’s College of Natural Resources and the Environment. She has also been on the faculty at the University of Kentucky and OSU, and worked as chief of the watershed ecology branch in Corvallis for the Environmental Protection Agency.

An author of more than 100 publications, McComb recently published a book on wildlife habitat management, and is continuing studies on habitat availability for focal species over the Oregon Coast Range, and associations of songbirds with farming practices in western Oregon.