Monday Memo January 6, 2020
Dean's Message
Dear Colleagues:
Welcome back to a new semester, a new year, and a new decade! I hope your break was restful, and full of pleasant times with friends and family. I am optimistic that together we will make this a great semester and year for A&S, and that each of you will have a year full of friendship, accomplishment, and a sense of belonging.
We are a college of dedicated, brilliant, and caring staff and faculty. Additionally, and the reason we are all here, our A&S community includes thousands of hard-working students. I envision the College as a kind of second family, a place that is a truly a Community of Care. A&S should be where everyone wants to work and where students will always feel they have a home.
Creating this kind of community in A&S is a collective responsibility. As we move into 2020, I challenge each of you to reach out daily to at least one student and one colleague. Engage them in meaningful and caring conversation. Ask them how things are going, what they are feeling good about, and/or about their struggles. If each of us—staff and faculty—talks with one colleague and one student each day, we will make meaningful progress towards creating the community in which we all aspire to work. Staff, faculty, and students will begin to see that A&S is not a faceless bureaucracy, but a community of individuals who genuinely care about each other and who feel welcomed, included, and at a home.
As your interim dean, I too commit to taking steps toward building our sense of community. In the coming weeks, I will be rolling out some programs and opportunities that I am confident will, with participation from faculty and staff, not only make us kinder but also stronger, more committed, and more unified in our mission to provide the best educational experience possible for our students.
Sincerely,
David S. Owen, Ph.D.
Interim Dean, and
Professor of Philosophy
Call for 2020 A&S Awards Nominations
Please take the time to nominate your faculty and staff colleagues for a 2020 A&S award. Awards will be given at the A&S Celebration of Excellence on April 21, 2020, in the SAC Multipurpose Room. Winners of the A&S Distinguished Faculty Awards and Outstanding Performance Awards for staff will be forwarded to the President's Office as the College's nominations for the University-wide awards of the same name.
Nominations are due February 26, 2020. For more info and to nominate.
Anonymous Feedback
Interim Dean David Owen is committed to making A&S an inclusive and equitable work environment where the Cardinal Principal of “Respect” is valued and put into action. However, he needs your input in order to achieve that goal. Please submit your complaints, concerns, suggestions, etc. using our new anonymous feedback tool: uofl.me/as-anonymous.
Diversity and Inclusion
Call for Applications: Spring 2020 Faculty Fellowships
Are you interested to pursue racial/social justice research that works closely with community organizations, or administrative work at UofL that is boundary-crossing and advances transdisciplinary racial and social justice research?
The A&S Anne Braden Institute for Social Justice Research (ABI) is recruiting 2 new Spring 2020 faculty fellowships (with possible extension into AY2020-21).
Sustainability
Maple Tapping Workshop this Friday at noon
Join us in UofL's sustainable garden to learn about the process of tapping maple trees and making maple syrup. Workshop leader Dave Barker has been tapping trees and making his own syrup in Louisville for years. He will give a brief, hands-on workshop on the process and then attendees will get to work with him as we install taps on our own maple trees located in the Garden Commons and around campus.
Participants will have the opportunity to sign-up to volunteer to empty buckets as they fill throughout the coming weeks. Please dress warmly so we can work outside!
More info.
Kudos
Prof. Corbitt featured on Great Day Live
Prof. Cynthia Corbitt's (Biology) research and community outreach with veterans was featured on WHAS-TV's Great Day Live this morning. Corbitt's research shows veterans with PTSD who participate in group dancing one hour a week for 10 weeks have an improvement in overall wellness scores. See more at https://youtu.be/jVsKnJvHk2Q
Great Place to Work
Dare to Lead is Louisville Alumni Book Club selection
The next book for the Louisville Alumni Book Club is Dare to Lead by Brené Brown! Although the Book Club is an initiative for alumni, it is open to all members of the UofL community. Join here.
They’ll officially kick off the book on Monday, January 6th and start the weeklong end-of-book discussion on March 5th. You can find the book here, your local bookstore, or at your local library.
Mary Beth Albright of the Washington Post raves, “Expect to take notes in the margins of Dare to Lead. It’s an absorbingly actionable handbook on creating a space for better work and more fulfilled people.”
If you are ready to take the next steps towards becoming a braver leader, get your copy of the Dare to Lead soon before the book club discussion begins!
Great Place to Learn
Two A&S students named to 2020 Kentucky Derby Festival Royal Court
The Festival’s Royal Court is an opportunity for young women to earn scholarship monies, as well as serve as an official ambassador for the city and the Kentucky Derby Festival, held during the two weeks leading up to the Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday in May. Each court member receives $2000 in scholarship funding.
Giavanna (Gia) Combs is a 20-year-old junior majoring in Psychology with a minor in Pan-African studies. She is a Woodford R. Porter Scholar, Denny Crum Scholar, and a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated.
Leah Hazelwood is a 19-year-old sophomore dual-majoring in Political Science and Liberal Studies with concentrations in race & gender studies, global public health, and economics. She is a McConnell Scholar, a Harvard Kennedy Public Policy Leadership Scholar, and a member of Chi Omega Sorority.
Items of Note
Community Engagement Activity Reporting
Deadline is June 1.
UofL’s annual Community Engagement Activity Reporting helps us demonstrate all the ways UofL faculty, staff, and students collaborate with external partners to improve communities locally, nationally, and abroad. Visit the website to get started updating your ongoing activity reports or to let us know about new activities initiated in 2019-20.
Additional Information: Pat Smith
In the News
UofL professor talks next steps on the impeachment of President Trump (WDRB, 12/18/19) - Prof. Jasmine Farrier (Political Science) weighs in on the impeachment process.
In 2020, The Future is Wow (LEO Weekly, 12/18/19) - Prof. Ricky Jones (Pan African Studies) featured, along with former and current A&S students.
Punished: Louisville Teens Charged As Adults Are Almost Always Black (WFPL, 1/6/20) - Prof. Cherie Dawson-Edwards (Criminal Justice) speaks about the adultification of Black youth.
