Change in schedule

The best laid plans - I was planning to be on the downtown campus tomorrow but now I'll be somewhere in Westchester.

And so it goes....

Where is the semester going? And where have I been?

Ooops-how did an entire month go by without a post. I've just broken rule #1 of the blogosphere-post predictably.

The beginning of the semester has been very very busy. Both cohorts of the DPS program have gotten off to a good start, our new group of Seidenberg Scholars are now settled, and all of the beginning of the semester "bugs" have been ironed out. It's practically time for midterms, as a former student who ran into me at the parking lot in Pleasantville reminded me.

Cathy Dwyer and I were invited to speak at a Women in Engineering conference sponsored by the IEEE in White Plains at the end of September. Marleen Waijjer, an alum of our graduate program, contacted us. I put together a panel that included Staci Burke, a graduate student in our Information Systems program, and Christelle Scharf attended. It was nice to see the Seidenberg School so well represented.

We also sponsored two graduate students who attended the Grace Hopper Conference in Tucson at the end of September (September was a busy month).

As many of you know, the University has decided to move programs out of One Martine Avenue by June. Geoff Brackett provided some details at our Faculty Council meeting on October 9. The folks affected by the move will form a Seidenberg Team, working with Tobias Bisharat of facilities planning. We'll provide details as they become available. We're looking at all options, including leasing smaller space in White Plains and moving some programs to the Law School on a temporary basis.

The kickoff for the First Tech Challenge went well-many thanks to Rick Kline and Bernice Houle who led the effort, and all who participated in the planning and/or attended the event.

The chairs and I have been experimenting with every-other-week conference calls to supplement our once a month face-to-face meetings, and the Associate and Assistant Deans and I have been keeping in touch with every other week conference calls to supplement the one-on-one meetings we try to have each week or so. The frequent conversations have been very helpful to me, and I hope to all who have been participating.

I'll be downtown today, October 22 and part of tomorrow. Next week I'll be on the Pleasantville campus on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, downtown on Tuesday and I'm not sure where on Thursday!

I had hoped to schedule office hours this semester but so far my schedule has been too fluid. I'm hoping that things will "settle down" soon, and that I'll be able to hold hours in Pleasantville on Mondays and at 163 William Street on Thursdays, but we'll see!

The High Holydays are upon us as is the second week of school

First, let me wish l'shanah tovah to all who are celebrating the Jewish New Year, year 5770. May you have a sweet year.

The semester is well underway. Special thanks to everyone who made the beginning of the year as smooth as possible and who stayed as late as necessary, or came in as early as necessary, to make this happen.

I hope by now you've received the announcement of the departmental chairs for this academic year: Information Technology, NY: John Molluzzo, Information Technology Westchester: Dan Farkas, Computer Science, NY: Sotiris Skevoulis, Computer Science, Westchester: Narayan Murthy.

We are starting our first academic year with our new structure, and we'll be evaluating it and "tweaking" it as needed during the year.

Enjoy your weekend, and I'll look for each of you as I move around the campuses next week, beginning with half a day in Pleasantville and at One Martine Avenue on Monday, and then the rest of the week at One Martine with the exception of Thursday when I'll be downtown for Dean's Council and Management Council.

Welcome back!

School has started-boy has it ever! Sunday was Convocation, where Reverend Carter Via gave us much to think about - "What kind of person do you want to be?" Reverend Via has worked with Wangari Maathai for many years had many "Mangari" stories. His stories helped to make the heroine of the book Unbowed come alive for me.m What a wonderful way to start off the semester!

I was lucky enough to hear Wangari Maathai preach at White Plains Presbyterian Church when Reverend Via was the senior minister there. I found her words inspiring then, as I did anew when I read her memoir.

A few quick highlights of the year ahead:

• We will begin the process of restructuring the academic departments in the School with the formation this fall of the Information Technology Departments on each of the campuses. Departments will be meeting next week and chair elections will be held before the week's end.

• We are working on the promotional materials for the new Bachelor of Science in Information Technology, with interdisciplinary tracks in cybersecurity, web and digital media, networking and information management.

• Within the next week I'll be circulating a review of the last year, highlighting the many recruiting and retention activities we conducted, the enhancements we've made in all areas of our curricula, and the awards and grants members of the School have received.

Tomorrow I'll be in Pleasantville. For those of us who were downtown, or for that matter anywhere in the metropolitan area, the events of September 11, 2001 might still seem very close-I know they are for me.

I'll be in Pleasantvillle on Monday and Friday, at One Martine Avenue on Tuesday, at Midtown on Wednesday morning for a meeting with our advisory board and then at 163 in the afternoon.
Thursday is still up in the air.

Enjoy the first week of school!

It's Back to School Time

Hard to believe but here it is, time for a new semester.

I hope to see many of you at convocation on Sunday, September 6. And I also hope that many of you have had a chance to read Unbowed, Wangari Mathaai's memoir.

The summer has flown by but I trust that we are all looking forward to a fruitful academic year.
A few quick reminders:

• Richard "Rick" Kline has been named Associate Dean and will be working with the department chairs on the schedule; working with faculty and Victor Goldsmith and others in Sponsored Research on grants, especially those from stimulus funding, and will be coordinating our interdisciplinary work. You can find Richard's office across the hall from mine in New York.
• We will be coming back to a reorganized School with four departments for this next transition year; please refer to the Restructuring Document that was distributed in June for more details.
• Faculty, please make sure that your chair and Fran O'Gara both know your office hours.

I'll be at One Martine Avenue on Monday, at 163 William Street on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and off on Friday next week.



The following week I'll be in New York on Tuesday morning and in Pleasantville on Tuesday afternoon, then New York on Thursday and Pleasantville on Wednesday and Friday.

I look forward to seeing you at Convocation, at Academy Day, and around campus.

Enjoy this last weekend of the summer!

Vacation from Blogging

I've been taking a vacation from blogging, and much to my surprise, a few of you said you missed it! I'm flattered that you've been reading this-thanks!

And next week I'm taking a real vacation-a week off to explore the area around Hudson, New York. Hardly far from home.

I'll also be catching up on my reading, and working on brushing up my time management skills. I'm trying to fit in a 9 hour course called-are you ready?-Get Time Video Boot Camp by Dave Crenshaw, the author of The Myth of Multitasking. If I follow his regimen he promises me 10 to 20 hours a week-I could sure use an extra 10 hours a week!

I'll be downtown tomorrow, on vacation next week, and then in Pleasantville on July 20 and 21, maybe even the 22, downtown the morning of the 23rd and at the Grad Center the afternoon of the 23rd and all day the 24th.

I know I'll be downtown on Tuesday the 28th for a breakfast event with Year Up, a group that we've partnered with to provide college credits to "urban young adults."

Beyond that I don't know what my schedule is!

I hope everyone is getting a chance for some well earned "r & r" and taking advantage of this uncharacteristically lovely July weather.

The Semester is coming to an end

and some days I feel as though I am, too!

Sotirious and I had a great visit with Dean David Miller at the College of Computing and Digital Media at DePaul University in Chicago. The College is made up of two schools, the School of Computing and the School of Cinema and Digital Media.

Lots for the Academic Restructuring Task Force to think about-we're meeting Tuesday at 11 AM to discuss our recommendations.

I'll be in NY on Tuesday, at the Graduate Center on Wednesday and Friday and in Pleasantville on Thursday.

Hope to see some of you at the Michael L. Gargano Research Day at the Graduate Center this Friday, May 8.

Pretend this is Thursday's post

because since the holidays I have been totally confused about what day is what.

Here's my schedule for the next couple of weeks:

Monday, Friday: Pleasantville
Tuesday: Grad Center
Wednesday: AM, Midtown, then fly to Chicago with Sotirious to visit with Dean Miller of DePaul's College of Digital Media, home on Thursday

The week of May 4th I'm in Pleasantville on Monday, Downtown NY on Tuesday and Thursday and at the Graduate Center on Wednesday and Friday-Friday of that week is Michael Gargano Research Day. Please plan to join us.

The week of May 11th I'm at the Grad Center on Monday and on the Pace Plaza campus for the rest of the week attending the Faculty Institute on Wednesday and Thursday and facilitating the tenure and promotion workshop on Friday.

And then there's Commencement Week-see you all at one of the various commencements.

The faculty restructuring group finished its fifth meeting and we all feel as though we are making significant progress. Please feel free to discuss our meetings with any of the members: Paul Benjamin, Linda Jo Calloway, Dan Farkas, Jim Gabberty, Richard Kline, Frank Marchese.

Susan Downey and I have been working on the School's budget, and the University Budget Committee has been working on the University's budget. This will be a very challenging budget year, and we are working very hard to find financial aid for students who need it.

Speaking of scholarship aid, mark your calendars now for this year's Leadership and Service in Technology event which will be held on Tuesday June 9 at 6 PM at Bank of New York Mellon on Barclay Street. We will be honoring Viacom's CIO Joe Simon. Steve Cooper, former CIO of the American Red Cross and the Department of Homeland Security, will be our keynote speaker, on the theme Transformation Through Technology. This event raises money that is used for scholarship aid-even more important in these challenging times.

We are exploring some interesting opportunities with a few universities in China, thanks to Lixin Tao. When these are approved, students will complete the first year of a graduate degree in China and spend their second year on campus and graduate from the Seidenberg School.

Please make sure to read the University Strategic Plan, and attend one of the town meetings and/or one of our Seidenberg meetings-I'll be presenting the plan next Tuesday at the Graduate Center and on May 5 at 163 William Street.

Enjoy this wonderful weather-I'm spending the next two days in the garden, building and filling raised beds.

The Hol(y)days are over, the Strategic Plan is here

For those of us celebrating Passover and/or Easter the hol(y)days are over. And for that I'm grateful. Between the chocolate covered matzoh and the marzipan Easter eggs I am in big trouble, foodwise. I hope everyone enjoyed the holidays.

I love these two holidays because they remind me each year that Spring does come, that renewal is possible and in fact, often inevitable. As small groups of us are meeting to decide if/how/when to restructure our school reminders of renewal and new growth are welcome.

We are coming to the end of open houses and preview weekends. Our undergraduate enrollment numbers are not as strong as we need them to be; we need everyone to do all that they can to support our recruitment efforts as we move through this next critical period.

Please make sure to attend an open meeting about the current draft of the University's Strategic Plan. There will be a meeting April 14, from 3:30-4:25 in Butcher Suite on the Pleasantville campus, another on April 20 from 12:20-1:15 in the Student Union on the NY campus, and the last one on April 24 from 12:20-1:15 in the VIP Room in the Goldstein Fitness Center on the Pleasantville campus.

I will also be holding Seidenberg School discussions as follows: on April 23, in Goldstein 100 on the Pleasantville campus, from 12:20-1:20, on April 28 at the Graduate Center in Room 204 from 3:30-4:30, and on May 5 at 163 William Street from 3:30-4:30.

I also encourage you to discuss the plan among yourselves. You can find the contents of the plan by logging on to your Pace portal.

This week I'm in NY on Monday and Thursday, at the Graduate Center on Tuesday morning and Friday, and on the Pleasantville campus Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday.

Mostly I'm working on the budget for fiscal year 2009-2010 and continuing to focus on restructuring meetings with faculty and staff.

We are now at the point in the semester where the time flies by. Faculty, you will be meeting with your department chairs (if you haven't already) to discuss your self-evaluations and your plans for next academic year. I thought I would have time to meet with each of you before the end of the semester but instead I'll schedule more leisurely meetings throughout the next academic year. Staff, you will be meeting with your supervisors shortly using the new performance form that was developed this year.

See you round campus or in cyberspace!

Schedule for March 30 through April 10

I'm in Pleasantville today, I'll be in NY tomorrow and Wednesday, back in Pleasantville on Thursday, at the Graduate Center on Friday morning and then in Pleasantville for the Westchester Faculty Council meeting on Friday afternoon.

Tomorrow Jonathan will be at Microsoft for DigiGirlz day; I'll be there in the afternoon.

Wednesday evening I'll be attending the NYCSPIN (Software Process Improvement Network) meeting.

The following week I'll be off on Thursday for Passover and on Friday to observe Good Friday (nothing like an interfaith relationship to remind you of the proximity of these two holidays). Monday and Wednesday I'll be a the Graduate Center, and Tuesday I'll be in Pleasantville.

School Restructuring

The project that is currently consuming most of my time and effort (aside from next year's budget!) is evaluating the structure of the school. We've currently got two task forces going-one on the academic side and one on the administrative side.

Some of you are wondering why I am handling these as two separate issues. I see the focus of the two groups as very different; the academic side of the School is charged with determining an academic structure that will foster and facilitate interdisciplinary programs while keeping a strong, focused computing/IT core. Much of that work will involve thinking about academic programs. The administrative structure needs to support faculty, staff and students on multiple locations at all levels-undergraduate, graduate, doctoral, external.

The Academic Restructuring Group will be meeting every Wednesday from now until April 29. Our goal is to have recommendations in place by May 1.

We had an excellent meeting and I believe that we are all very positive about our ability to coalesce around a set of recommendations. We also agreed that I would use my blog to post summaries of our meetings.

Here is what we've worked out so far:

Outcome from Week 1: What kind of school do we want to be?

“We want to be a school that offers strong, relevant, and attractive programs leading to degrees and minors internal and external to Seidenberg that are simultaneously (a) mutually beneficial and (b) leverage the interests of faculty.”

What is a strong core program? Technically challenging and intellectually stimulating

What is a relevant core program? Relevant to student body, and to the external community (both for-profit & not-for-profit)

What is an attractive core program? It draws enrollment, attracts potential students and is generally appealing to non-computing and administrative personnel.

What are the interests of the faculty? Research, teaching, etc…

To realize this vision, we need to consider ways to make this happen. Over the next weeks we will be discussing the following issues/topics:

Week 2:

Focus on core programs that are responsive to the needs of

• External Schools (interdisciplinary)

• Internal (core programs)

Week 3:

Special programs – DPS, NACTEL, Online, International, CLOUT, CIS 101 (enrollment, cost, margin)

Week 4:

Structure and governance of the school

Week 5:

Resources and faculty issues

Week 6:

Marketing above 5 outcomes to University Administration & Seidenberg Faculty

I also met with my direct reports, and we are looking at the administrative side of the school. In particular, we are defining what functions need to be done, which of the functions are location specific, and which are school wide. We will be using this to identify what resources are available where, and how we might make the best use of all of the talent in the School. We will be producing a set of recommendations by May 15.

I extend my thanks to everyone who is working with me in this transformation of our school.

Addendum

Two things that need to be added:

1. I'm at the Grad Center on Monday and Thursday, downtown on Tuesday, midtown on Wednesday and in Pleasantville on Friday
2. The Faculty Restructuring Team and I had our organizing "meeting" on Friday. We will be meeting every Wednesday from now until April 29. I'll be using this blog as a way to keep everyone informed. I am also working with an Administrative Restructuring Team to review the administrative structure; we are meeting on Thursday and will continue to meet over the next 7 weeks or so.

Spring Break

For some of us there really hasn't been a break; some faculty have been catching up, or working on new initiatives, or learning new things. And of course the staff have been here every day.

But as spring arrives, and the crocuses start coming up in my yard, I'm reminded that tomorrow is the first day of spring-new growth, new beginnings. Thanks to the faculty who participated and voted for six representatives to work with me to redefine the school. As you know, you elected, in no particular order, Jim Gabberty, Richard Kline, Frank Marchese, Paul Benjamin, Linda Jo Calloway and Dan Farkas. And thanks to you for your willingness to serve.

I put a poll on my blog for students http://deanknapp.blogspot.com asking what students wanted to study. Twelve students responded, as follows: three want to study games and simulation, three want to study medical informatics, one wants to study computer forensics, one wants to study digital art, and one wants to study "other." Interesting.

I've been thinking about education, technology, Web 2.0 and how it all fits together (or doesn't). And then there was this tweet on Twitter "Who needs a university when we have Google?" - Jeff Jarvis #hackedu http://tinyurl.com/d5dyj7

Gives one pause, or at least it should. Comments, anyone?

Spring Break - already?

Yes, next week is Spring break even though today it was cold here in Westchester.

Full time faculty make sure to submit your faculty activity report no later than March 30 (and of course earlier if possible!)

Tomorrow the Seidenberg Faculty Council is meeting. I look forward to seeing you there.

Next week I'll be at the NYC campus on Monday and Thursday, at the Graduate Center on Tuesday, and on the Pleasantville campus on Wednesday and Friday.

A few highlights:

• Jonathan and Bernice are attending the annual conference of National Consortium of Specialized Secondary Schools of Science, Technology Engineering and Math along with Brian Cosgrove of our Advisory Board
• Dawn Rigney has joined us as our Director of Development
• Help is needed for commencement-please volunteer to help out

Enjoy the break!

Interdisciplinary Work

"When you are up to your a** in alligators it's difficult to remember that your original mission was to clear the swamp." American business saying.

I realize that our main focus needs to be on supporting interdisciplinary work, in all its forms: learning communities, service learning courses, minors, sequences.

The second task is to restructure in a way that supports that work.

What do faculty think about these ideas?

• faculty who teach service learning courses earn four credits for a three credit course.
• faculty who teach learning communities can bank a credit of release time.
• faculty will be expected to teach or develop an interdisciplinary course, learning community or service learning course once every three years

Let me know what you think. Comment, e-mail or respond to the poll. Thanks.

Faculty Meetings

Thanks to all of you who attended this week's faculty meetings, and for your feedback on the proposed organizational structure changes. I'm working on a "revised" structure and will be asking the faculty council to elect a "transition team" of faculty to work with me on the implementation details.

I haven't forgotten that I've asked the staff to set goals, too, and I'll be working with staff leadership over the next few weeks to develop a mechanism for goal setting.

And the next few weeks will be busy ones-Susan Downey and I are knee deep in budget discussions with the Provost, President and Finance and Administration.

I'll be emailing faculty evaluation material next week; I'll be asking for self evaluations to be returned to me and the department chairs after the break.

And I'm pleased to announce that we have a Development Director. Dawn Rigney will be joining Pace University on Wednesday March 4. She reports to me and to Philanthropy. She'll be based in Pleasantville during the Spring while she and I get to know each other. Once she gets settled she'll be based in White Plains at the Graduate Center.

This has been a busy couple of days at the downtown campus. Ivan Seidenberg visited the Computer Club and the Seidenberg Scholars on Wednesday. Joe McKay was the guest artist at last night's Digital Gallery reception-the evening was fabulous and provocative. We also had Ernest Von Simpson conducting a four week IT entrepreneurship seminar.

I'll be in Pleasantville on Monday, Tuesday and Friday, New York on Thursday and at the Graduate Center on Wednesday of next week.

Strategic Planning, UPE, Budgeting, Digital Gallery - Lots going on!

Thanks to everyone who attended last week's school meeting. We will all need to work together to redefine and refocus our school and I appreciate your support in the days ahead.

A few things of interest:

• The Strategic Planning Committee is meeting next week to put the final touches on a draft that will be circulated to the community for discussion and comments. We will then focus our School's strategic plan on the goals in the University's strategic plan.

• Monday at the Graduate Center at 5 PM we are inducting students into Upsilon Pi Epsilon, the international honor society for the computing and information disciplines. Please plan to join us as you are able.

• Ivan Seidenberg will be meeting with the Computer Club and the Seidenberg Scholars at the New York campus on Wednesday during common hour.

• The budget process is beginning. The University Budget Committee has been meeting. Dan Farkas, Fred Grossman and I serve on that committee; we also serve on subcommittees. The Budget Committee includes representatives from each location council, and I believe that those representatives will be reporting at the location council meetings.

• It's not too soon to prepare for the Middle States accrediting team visit, March 22 through the 25. You can find the self-study document here. Please make sure that you are familiar with what's in the document, particularly those sections that refer to our School. Members of the team might want to discuss the document with you.
  

In preparation for next year's budget, I'll be circulating materials to faculty for our annual self-evaluations next week. I will be scheduling meetings with each faculty member to discuss this year's accomplishments and goals for the next academic year.

I haven't finalized next week's schedule yet but I know I'll be in Pleasantville Monday morning and at the Graduate Center on Monday afternoon. I'll be at the New York city campus part of every day next week except Monday. I will be attending the Digital Gallery presentation-hope to see some of you there.

Big Week

Tomorrow is our Seidenberg School meeting. Provost Geoff Brackett will be joining us, and I hope to see as many of you as possible at 9:30 tomorrow morning at the Graduate Center.

Congratulations to Jim Lawler who received a Thinkfinity Grant, and to Dan Farkas and Joe Ryan of Dyson College who together received a Thinkfinity Grant (apologies to Dan and Joe-I didn't have my spreadsheet in front of me when I posted yesterday) . We also had a very inspiring day last Friday at the follow up meeting of Dyson College and Seidenberg School faculty exploring collaboration possibilities in digital media. John Molluzzo, Cathy Dwyer, Jennifer Thomas, Richard Kline, Dan Farkas, Hsui-lin Winkler, Lixin Tao and Sung Hyuk Cha joined Will Pappenheimer, Ruth Johnston, Catherine Zimmer, Linda Anstendig, Rebecca Martin, Joe Ryan, Kathleen Roche, Tom Henthorne, PV Viswanath (we made him an honorary Dyson College-Seidenberg School faculty member for the day, even though we know he's from the Lubin School), Zhaohua Dai, Nira Herrmann, Beth Klingner and me. We've reached "critical mass" in some areas and I expect that some small groups will be forming and working on "next steps."

And speaking of digital media, the Seidenberg School and Dyson College collaborate on the Digital Gallery, co-curated by Dr. Frank Marchese and Dr. Jillian McDonald.

The latest exhibit, which opened on February 10, is entitled The Aesthetics of Gaming. The artist Joe McKay will speak publicly about his work on Thurs Feb 26, 5:00 pm, followed by a reception at 6:00 pm. I enjoyed the fall Digital Gallery events very much, and I expect the Spring to be equally provocative. This exhibit is particularly timely as we consider how to bring game engineering and game design courses into our curriculum.

I am looking forward to resting on President's Day. Tuesday I'll be at the Graduate Center, Wednesday I'll be in New York City, mostly in meetings-Management Council (the officers of the University) from 9 until 11:30, Dean's Council from 11:30 until 2:30 and then the Budget Committee is meeting from 3 until 5. Whew-what a day.

Thursday I'm in Pleasantville and Friday I'm in New York, with many fewer meetings.

Catch you on the campus, and enjoy the holiday.

A Busy First Week of February

Tomorrow we'll have the follow up meeting of Dyson and Seidenberg faculty to see how our collaborations in digital media are coming along. We'll have "new" folks so it should be fun.

Yesterday the Computer Club on the NYC had Staci Burke and Mirkeya Cappellan, two Pace graduate students who attended the Grace Hopper Conference, speak about their experiences. Mirkeya attended last year and Staci attended this year. Fran Allen, a great friend of our school who serves on our Advisory Board, was one of the keynote speakers at this year's conference. The conference is sponsored by the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology.

The weather has been a challenge, and it's only February 5. As I write this it's 8 degrees outside my house. I hope that we're done with snow for a little while at least.

Next week I'm in Pleasantville on Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon, at the Graduate Center Tuesday and Friday morning, and in New York on Thursday.

I hope to see many of you on Friday for our School meeting with the Provost.

We're off to a good start

for the Spring semester.

Some highlights so far:

1. The Advisory Board met and discussed the Seidenberg Curriculum Task Force Report. I've sent the overview to department and curriculum committee chairs for review and discussion with their respective faculty. I'll be delivering a copy to the Provost tomorrow at my regularly scheduled meeting with him.
2. We are also busy planning the Leadership in Service and Technology Award evening, tentatively scheduled for Tuesday June 9 (very tentatively).
3. Thanks to a recommendation by one of our board members, we are now affiliate members of NCSSSMST and will be including those secondary schools in our outreach.
4. The Building Livable Communities in Second Life Competition was held on the Pleasantville campus on Friday, January 24. Thanks to Jean Coppola for serving as a faculty advisor, and to Matt Ganis for providing technical support. Three teams competed, and finished in the following order: Pace University, Monroe College and Manhattanville College.

This current economic environment will certainly challenge us as we work with admissions to bring in a fall class. I know I can count on all of you to help as needed with our outreach efforts.

I'm planning on scheduling an "all school" meeting for February 13 at the Graduate Center. Please mark your calendars now-details will follow early next week.

See you on campus one of these days:
Monday and Friday next week I'm in Pleasantville, Tuesday and Wednesday I'm at the Graduate Center, and Thursday I'm in New York.

Blog for Students

I love blogging so much that I am now blogging specifically for students. You can see that blog here: Dean Knapp's Blog

Please let your students know that they can read the Dean's Blog at http://deanknapp.blogspot.com where I will be blogging every Thursday.

The Semester Begins!

and is off to a running start.

Happy 2009 everyone! It was wonderful that so many faculty and staff were able to join Anne and me for our open house. Thanks to all who came-it was a wonderful day.

We had an Advisory Board meeting today and I'm pleased to say that the Advisory Board recommendations regarding curriculum are just about ready to be distributed. I will be sharing them with the Provost next week, and then I'll distribute them widely. In addition we've formed an Academic Review and Enhancement Committee of the Board which will provide us with other perspectives on our curricula renewal.

We've also formed an Outreach Committee, and Jonathan and I visited Brooklyn Tech High School right after Christmas, thanks to Brian Cosgrove, a member of our Board, who has done some consulting work with the Brooklyn Tech Alumni Foundation. We are looking to develop a partnership there-more as that develops.

I'll be in Pleasantville tomorrow with the morning taken up with a Budget Committee meeting. Monday morning I'll be in NYC at a Strategic Planning Committee meeting, and then hosting Dr. Wesley Chu, a colleague of Chienting Lin, who is visiting from Taiwan. Tuesday and Friday I'm in Pleasantville and Wednesday and Thursday I'm at the Graduate Center.

I'm working on a draft discussion document for distribution in early February that will serve as a "blueprint" for our reorganization. I've blocked off most of Tuesday of next week to write the first draft; the rest of the week includes meetings with Philanthropy to discuss plans for this year's LST (we're currently looking at the second week of June) and my regularly scheduled meeting with the Provost.

We're watching our fall enrollments and hoping that they will at least hold flat for next year. As more information becomes available I'll share it with you. Faculty, try to attend the location Faculty Council meetings where much of this information is disseminated, and staff, try to attend the Staff Administrative Council.

I wish us all peace and happiness (and lots of students!) in this new year!