2014

As the semester winds down, commencement is done, and the holiday season begins in earnest, it is a good time for reflection. We have had a very eventful year, with the naming of the Voiland College, skyrocketing enrollments, record research and scholarly activity, the addition of numerous new faculty and staff, multiple lab and studio renovations, and construction of our first building in 20 years. It’s been a great year, and now we have a moment to take a break before it all starts again.

We have received notification that Amit Bandyopadhyay, professor in the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, has been named a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI)! Congratulations, Amit!!

I hope your semester is going well. It’s hard to believe that Thanksgiving is next week!

Over the past several months, the Voiland College leadership team has been working on a faculty responsibilities document intended to provide some guidelines for balancing research, teaching and service activities.

I am pleased to announce that we have received authorization to move forward with our hiring plans for this year. I thought you might be interested to know that we hired 18 tenure-track faculty members as a result of our searches last year. So if it seemed like last year was exceptionally busy, there was a very good reason for that!

I wanted to thank all of you who joined in last week’s joyous Voiland College of Engineering and Architecture naming celebration. What a great event!

The showers just missed us, and it was a glorious evening to celebrate a historic moment for the college and for WSU.

Can you believe it? Today is the first day of fall classes! I hope you have had a restful summer and are gearing up for what promises to be a very busy and exciting academic year. A hearty welcome to our new faculty and staff!

I am certain you have noticed that our college has experienced unprecedented growth in the past few years.

As you know from my previous email sent last month (3/28/2014), we are in the midst of the next strategic planning process in the college. The university is in the process of finalizing its next strategic plan, and that final copy will be available soon. Now it’s time for us to reflect on how we “map” to the university plan, and how we are going to get there.

I would like to start by telling you all, “Thank You!”

I know this has been one of our busiest years in a very long time. I can’t tell you how much we appreciate all your efforts through this challenging year of growth, even while you have continued your daily work of research, scholarship, outreach, and helping our students succeed.