Monthly Letter to Faculty: September 2023
Dear Faculty Colleagues,
I hope your semester is in full swing. Can you believe it’s only three weeks before Fall Break? I am especially mindful of the academic calendar this semester because I am team teaching Library 290 with Tim Pyatt, dean of the Z. Smith Reynolds Library. I relish every minute with our fabulous students who are curious, imaginative and deeply engaged in the experiences and ideas we share with them.
Rankings
The strength of our terrific students, along with the excellence of our impressive teacher-scholar faculty, challenges this week’s U.S. News rankings release. You do not need to be a statistician to recognize that U.S. News adopted a new methodology to calculate its 2024 National Universities ranking. Seventeen of the 19 indicators used in this year’s methodology differ from last year’s and the new methodology favors large public universities and AAU schools. The most critical hallmarks of a Wake Forest education – especially small classes and personal attention and mentoring from professors who are top scholars in their fields – are not valued in the new rankings. While we appreciate the fact that the new rankings focus on social mobility and the impact of faculty research, because these are two essential Wake Forest commitments, the worth of the U.S. News rankings as a decision-making tool for families with college-bound students is questionable. Wake Forest is academically excellent and continues to deliver a transformative education regardless of its U.S. News ranking.
Strategic Framework, Accreditation and QEP
Meanwhile, thanks to everyone who has shared their enthusiasm for the Strategic Framework with me these past few weeks. It is affirming to hear how many faculty embrace the Wake Forest values inscribed in it and look forward to taking them to the next level. The Deans of the College and Graduate and Professional Schools are kicking off their school’s strategic framework-making this semester, while Senior Advisor for Strategic Initiatives Matthew Phillips will liaise unit framework action steps with other campus partners over the year ahead. Right now, the best way for you to get involved is to participate in your school’s framework process. We will post our University’s collective progress on our Strategic Framework website later this semester. We know this institutional framing work is one of the most effective pathways for delivering on our learning aspirations for our students. It is serendipitous that we have begun this framing process in advance of our ten-year reaffirmation of our accreditation (2025-2026) and Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). Our Strategic Framework provides a wealth of possible topics suited to our next QEP. Almost every aim focused on our students’ learning, inquiry, and engagement in partnerships has the potential to be shaped into an outstanding QEP. We are eager for your help in creating QEP proposals and selecting a final QEP topic. We will announce proposal criteria on September 25, and the deadline for submissions will be January 8. We seek ideas that garner broad support and will make an important impact on all student learning, not just undergraduate students. QEPs can focus on any population of students or across student populations too, and they can come from any set of University partners. Look for future updates from Associate Provost Anne Hardcastle on our QEP selection process this year and opportunities to participate in proposals and feedback. Ultimately, the strongest QEP proposals will affirm that student learning and success stand at the very core of our institutional mission and will be linked to at least one Strategic Framework aim.
Impact of ACC Expansion
Because student learning is at the heart of our mission, it is no surprise that the ACC expansion announcement raised faculty concerns about its potential impact on student-athletes. I am appreciative of the Faculty Senate’s invitation to Athletic Director John Currie and me to discuss the issue at yesterday’s Senate meeting. AD Currie shared the minimal changes in travel scheduling anticipated, and we both shared our longstanding commitment to student academic success. Specifically, I have asked Anne Hardcastle, associate provost for academic affairs, to bring together advising leadership across the College, the Graduate School, the Business School and Student Athlete Advising Services to strengthen collaboration on behalf of student-athlete success.
Slavery, Race, University History and Campus Memorialization
I hope you read earlier this month about the Campus Memorialization Steering Committee’s charge from President Wente to facilitate campus conversations about what it means to recognize Wake Forest’s historical ties to slavery with a campus memorial. Last weekend, this committee, along with President Wente, traveled to University of Virginia, University of Richmond, and the College of William & Mary to meet with academic and community leaders committed to this work, including our Baskervill partners who will be leading our upcoming campus fora. We came back from this intense experience with high hopes that these future conversations will lead to a stunning memorial that will serve as a powerful catalyst for learning and truth. Please join one of these critical conversations and encourage your students to do so as well: click here to register for an open forum session. If you have not yet read To Stand With and For Humanity: Essays from the Slavery, Race and Memory Project, heralded in a recent review essay as a model volume on the history of university-based slavery, please do.
Graduate School Leadership Structure
I close this month’s letter by answering a frequently posed question: What is the new Graduate School leadership structure? The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences has been returned to an earlier structure in which one dean, in this case Dean Jackie Krasas, administers both divisions of the School. The Division of Arts and Sciences is supported by Sr. Associate Dean Tony Marsh, who reports to Dean Krasas. The Division of Biomedical Sciences is supported by Sr. Associate Dean Dwayne Godwin, who reports to Dean Krasas and Dean of the Medical School Ebony Boulware. In addition, it is important to note that Dean Krasas is both Dean of the Graduate School and Dean of the College. While the Graduate School and the College have not merged, this new leadership structure under one dean will allow the Graduate School and the College to better align with each other to provide enhanced support for faculty and graduate and undergraduate students. Please know I am always eager to answer your questions. You can send them to asktheprovost@wfu.edu
Invitation to URECA Day
I hope I see you at URECA Day this Friday, September 22, from 3:00-5:00 p.m. in the Sutton Center. It’s one of my favorite annual events at Wake Forest because it celebrates student-faculty engaged excellence at its finest.
With all best wishes,
Michele