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!