Edward McCord
Director of Programming
JD (Law), University of Pittsburgh
PhD (Philosophy), University of Pittsburgh
MA (Anthropology), University of Pittsburgh
AB, Princeton University
Office
3600 Cathedral of Learning
Phone
412-624-6886
Fax
412-624-6885
E-mail
emccord@pitt.edu
Edward McCord serves many roles at the University Honors College (UHC). He runs the Honors College Friday Afternoon Lecture Series and is editor of the UHC newsletter. He advises students in matters of every description and assists Amy Eckhardt in preparing students for national scholarship competitions. He is director of the Honors College Yellowstone Field Course, in which he teaches from mountain trails his principal areas of interest—environmental law, politics, and ethics. He team-teaches the core course for the environmental studies major, Environmental Science, Ethics and Public Policy, with geologist Mike Rosenmeier.
McCord is coordinator of the new Allen L. Cook Spring Creek Preserve in Wyoming, 4,700 acres of land assets recently donated to the Honors College by cattle rancher Allen Cook. McCord was a driving force from the start in conceptualizing this rich preserve of dinosaur paleontology, archaeology, and ecology to be a consortium shared by Pitt, the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and the University of Wyoming.
In 2005, McCord was appointed director of The American Experience Distinguished Lecture Series. The late Robert G. Hazo, devoted Honors College friend and associate, founded The American Experience more than 30 years ago to stimulate discussion of seminal issues in the company of the nation’s preeminent opinion makers. The roster of speakers in The American Experience reads as a virtual Who’s Who of political, journalistic, White House, congressional, and Pennsylvania leadership over the past three decades.
McCord received his AB from Princeton University and graduate degrees from Pitt in anthropology (MA), philosophy (PhD), and law (JD). He taught undergraduate courses in philosophy of science, logic, ethics, and the history of philosophy before completing the doctorate in philosophy. McCord’s dissertation analyzed the foundation of cultural anthropology in the interpretation of human behavior and responded to skepticism about the objectivity and precision of the discipline in light of this foundation. He is an affiliate professor in the Department of Philosophy and a resident fellow in Pitt’s Center for Philosophy of Science.
Following graduate school, McCord served as research associate for the senior vice chancellor of the health sciences, completing a report to the National Cancer Institute on the effect of federal regulations on the development of cancer drugs and redesigning the University-wide system that protects human subjects of research under federal law. Subsequently, McCord was appointed assistant for academic affairs to the chancellor of the University (Posvar), a position he held for seven years, and he completed law school in part-time study. Among many duties, McCord staffed the chancellor in his chairmanship of the EPA’s National Advisory Council on Environmental Policy and Technology (NACEPT) and served on the international and education committees of NACEPT.
McCord is admitted to law practice in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania and the U.S. Western District Court of the Western District of Pennsylvania. He served as a litigation associate in the Pittsburgh law firm, Reed Smith, for several years. McCord was recently admitted to practice pro hac vice in litigation in Florida, where he assists in several real estate class actions.
McCord is a Florida native and lifelong naturalist. He is an expert on carnivorous plants worldwide and the native orchids of North America. In his youth, he held employment with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, Glacier National Park, the Wisconsin field station of the National Audubon Society and Florida’s Tall Timbers Research Station, a renowned pioneer in the ecology of fire. McCord’s interests have led to travels throughout the United States, Europe, Malaysia, and Mongolia.