Lessons We Don’t Expect to Teach: Dr. Greg Prieto on Mortality and Meaning in the Classroom

Lessons We Don’t Expect to Teach: Dr. Greg Prieto on Mortality and Meaning in the Classroom

Dr. Greg Prieto in classroom

This week, the College of Arts and Sciences and the entire USD community will remember Dr. Greg Prieto, professor of sociology, who died in October after being diagnosed with cancer in March 2024. 

His legacy as an award-winning teacher-scholar is featured prominently in the 3rd edition of Arts & Sciences magazine. We invite you to read more about Dr. Prieto's passion for teaching, his advocacy and scholarship in the piece linked below, which captures his insights into teaching about living with a serious illness.

The Department of Sociology and the College of Arts and Sciences invite the campus community to honor Prieto's life on Thursday, November 6, at 5:30 p.m., in the courtyard at the Student Life Pavilion (3rd floor), with a reception to follow. 

To honor Prieto, the family kindly requests that memorial gifts be made to the University of San Diego College of Arts and Sciences in support of the Dr. Greg Prieto Memorial Scholarship. Gifts can be made online at Give to USD or by mail to College of Arts and Sciences Development, University of San Diego, 5998 Alcala Park, San Diego, CA 92110.
 

By Jillian Tullis

One of our mutual friends jokingly refers to Dr. Greg Prieto as the Mayor of Hillcrest, San Diego. You can hardly walk a few feet down University Avenue with Greg without running into someone he knows (I witnessed this on his birthday a few years ago). And like moths to a flame, they were all eager to bask in the glow of his warm smile and share a hug. 

I first caught a glimmer of this charisma when I met Greg, a professor of sociology at the University of San Diego, about nine years ago at a Rainbow Educator training. I was captivated by his lecture style, which I would describe as precise and passionate. It was clear Greg cared deeply about the subject matter and our learning. I had only been at USD for about a year, and it made me think I was going to need to step up my game! 

I’ve not managed to match his style, but our pedagogy overlapped more explicitly this year when Greg started teaching a course called The Sociology of Living and Dying. Since I’ve been studying and teaching about dying and death for 20 years, I was happy to share ideas for his course. 

As the semester wrapped up, I was eager to talk with Greg about his experience teaching about a topic so many folks want to avoid. So, on a sunny San Diego afternoon, we found time to sit down and chat about teaching and mortality over a cup of coffee.

Dr. Prieto has taught courses about controversial or taboo topics before on subjects such as sexualities, juvenile justice and immigration. He arrived at USD with “advocate’s zeal,” which he developed while studying sociology. Yet the turn towards teaching about the sociology of living and dying was guided by two factors: pedagogy and biology. 

Read the full article on page 35 of Arts & Sciences magazine (Fall 2025 issue).

Read the full article

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