The University of Pittsburgh's Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management is proud to announce that Dr. Molly Stitt-Fischer has been named Director of Environmental Health and Safety. Molly, who has been with the Department of Environmental Health and Safety since December 2010, will replace Assistant Vice Chancellor Jay Frerotte. Molly was selected from a pool of highly qualified candidates.
Frerotte will continue to serve as Assistant Vice Chancellor and will work closely with Molly until his planned retirement in January. Frerotte has been with the University since 2002 and has been an incredible and stabilizing force in building, maintaining and guiding the Department. While we will certainly miss Frerotte, we are fortunate to have him assisting in this transition.
The announcement was made in a letter to OPSEM staff by Vice Chancellor Ted Fritz.
Dr. Stitt-Fischer has most recently served as Pitt’s Biosafety Officer, where she managed biological and research laboratory safety inspection programs for the University. That work included management of a laboratory safety team consisting of 10 direct reports to support the University’s research mission and help ensure the safety of University constituents. In addition to her many duties, Dr. Stitt-Fischer has served as the University's lead authority on matters related to research safety. During the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Molly’s interpretations and recommendations were also critically helpful to supporting successful emergency operations at Pitt.
In naming Dr. Stitt-Fischer, the Office weighed her impeccable credentials with her approach that is customer service-oriented and aimed at furthering the partnerships with stakeholders at the University, the community, and other relevant industries.
Prior to joining Pitt, Dr. Stitt-Fischer worked as a Fellow and Associate Biosafety Officer within the National Biosafety and Biocontainment Training Program at the National Institutes of Health in Maryland. Before that, she was a Postdoctoral Researcher at Pitt's Department of Environmental and Occupational Health in the Graduate School of Public Health.
She has numerous professional certifications and publications, and has earned a B.S. in Molecular Biology from Allegheny College, an M.S. in Toxicology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. in Philosophy, Environmental and Occupational Health from Pitt's Graduate School of Public Health.