October 6, 2023
Dear colleagues,
Welcome to the end of a beautiful week of late summer weather, and here’s embracing the coolness of fall that will descend upon us next week. (Yes, the British do actually talk about nothing but the weather. I miss that.) A number of announcements this week, and then, of course, the sublinear zone.
- Our two wonderful Assistant Deans of Undergraduate Education, Ben Boone and Shelly Laurenzo, have decided to disaggregate their identities and have now become two separate and distinct beings, with separate and distinct titles. (Maria’s original plan in giving them the same title and the same job description was that as we lived into the new organizational structure in the Dean’s office, it would become clear what the best division of labor would be between the two of them). Shelly is now the Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education & Chief Transfer Officer, and her duties include – in an imprecise nutshell – all the student-facing and directly student-related work we do in the Dean’s office, and (as her title suggests) all A&S matters relating to transfer students. Ben is now the Assistant Dean for Educational Policy, and he is responsible for curriculum and enrollment planning, the CLA, and all aspects of SCHEV/SACSCOC work in A&S. (If you don’t know what those acronyms stand for, thank your lucky stars and Ben and Matt Smith, among others, for protecting you from this knowledge). Neither of these brief summaries actually captures the range of what either person does, but it’s a start.
- Please mark your calendars for Insights from Within, one of four A&S DEI strategic initiatives. Insights from Within focuses efforts on internal conversations that reflect the broad experiences of all Arts & Sciences stakeholders (i.e., students, staff, and faculty). This year's gathering will explore 'Innovative, Affirming, & Effective Mentoring' and will feature a working lunch (11:30-12:15pm) followed by concurrent breakout sessions (12:30-1:10pm) to explore best practices for graduate student mentoring, mentoring in STEM, mentoring among A&S staff and mentoring for faculty success. Sessions will be followed by a brief debrief and raffle ( 1:15-1:30pm). RSVP is requested before Saturday, October 7.
- Please also note the following opportunities to complete Implicit Bias (IB) training, necessary if you want to participate in a faculty search in 2023-24. If you completed this training last year, no need to do it again for this year. Upcoming dates of trainings are:
Tuesday, October 10, 2023 - 3:30 - 5:00pmWednesday, October 25, 2023 - 10:00 - 11:30amFriday, November 10, 2023 - 11:30am - 1:00pm
You can register for one of these workshops using this link: https://www.wm.edu/offices/diversity/announcements/faculty-implicit-bias-workshops.php. As an additional request, the A&S Dean's Office asks that faculty members submit this brief form if they completed the training on August 11, 2023, or after completing the training on October 10, 25 or November 10 to assist the office in maintaining an accurate record of trained A&S faculty. Link to participation form: https://wmsas.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1GqPEhS9bFNmvdA.
- Please note also that the application to teach in the W&M in Washington Center is now open. All faculty are invited to submit proposals to teach in the Center's Study in D.C. academic programs for the 2024-2025 academic year. No previous D.C. experience is required. Proposals are due by Monday, November 13th by 5pm. Faculty may find out more on the W&M Washington Center website: http://www.wm.edu/dc/faculty . All questions can be directed to Associate Director Erin Battle at eebattle@wm.edu.
- As you might have seen in the Provost’s 5 things email on October 2nd, there is a desire to understand better the range and scope of service responsibilities of faculty members. A service survey has been launched to collect information from all faculty members, and your perspectives are important in this effort. You may access the survey via this LINK. Thank you in advance for providing information on the type and amount of your service contributions.
- Finally, I am grateful to the President’s Office (and specifically Jeremy Martin, Vice-President for Strategy & Innovation) for sharing this slide with the BOV and now with us. I thought you would be interested to see enrollment growth over the past few years. There is no planned increase in undergraduate enrollment over the next few years: we have now met the BOV’s target for enrollment growth. You will see in the tall column here the anomalous year in which we had unprecedented levels of first-year enrollment. That year is gradually working its way through the system. We welcome the predictability of the next few years, and the transparent approach being taken by Admissions and by the President’s Office.
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Thank you to those of you sent in a caption for the photo below (last week’s challenge).
Some of my favorites are:
- “Sodexo or Aramark, Ma’am?” [You have to be in the know about recent changes in dining services provider at W&M to understand this one, but if you do, it’s very funny]. [submitted by Anonymous].
- “Your majesty, Pippa Middleton was unable to attend but hopes you will enjoy her buns.” [submitted by Anonymous].
- “OMG, more haggis baps?” [submitted by Dawn, though I do not know which Dawn.]
And now, a poem written by one of my closest associates in the Dean’s office, complete with photo (shared with their consent – I mean the author’s consent, not the chipmunk’s):
If ever a chippy 'twas destined for fame,
'Twas a wee Friday message from whence it came
By a clever wee Dean with her words so fine
In his bagpipes and cap below her line.
Happy weekend, all.
Suzanne
Suzanne Raitt
Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Chancellor Professor of English
Pronouns: she/her/hers
