President’s Newsletter

Friday, May 10, 2024

Dear Colleagues,

It is hard to believe that this is the last week of classes for the 2023-24 academic year. Thank you for all that you have done to ensure our students’ success this year. One of the best parts of this week was when the Presidential Teaching Excellence Award committee met. We got to read some stellar nomination letters from students about the difference that our faculty make. While every year we are treated to some wonderful tributes to our faculty, this year felt even more special. I look forward to announcing the latest winners at commencement. They will also be honored at the Faculty and Staff convocation this fall.

On Monday, we hosted Beth Berlin, SUNY’s Senior Vice Chancellor for Operations and Management and Chief Operating Officer, as part of her tour of campuses. She met with cabinet as well as representatives from HR, IT, and University Police. I also gave her a tour of campus. One reason that I like to give tours is that we all get so used to our surroundings that it is refreshing to see them anew and recognize how impressive and beautiful our campus is. I want to thank our grounds crew for all of the work they are putting in to enhance the campus every day.

This week included a blend of other internal and external meetings, including a meeting of the Rochester Area College presidents, a Rotary event, lunch with Susan Orr as UUP president, a trip to the REOC/Brockport Downtown, and lunch with the incoming and outgoing BSG student leaders. The Shared Governance committee met for the last time this academic year. We finalized an update to the Constitution of Campus-Wide Committees document and gathered additional resources for the website. We are also developing a template for orientation on shared governance and responsibilities for new committee chairs, which we hope to finalize in the fall. If you chair a campus-wide committee, be on the look out for an email in September asking for any reports from your committee, the updated membership, and your shared governance representatives.

Finally, we just received notification that we have earned the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) Silver STARS recognition for our sustainability efforts. This is terrific news as one of the goals of our strategic plan is to be a Sustainable and Thriving University for the 21st century. More information about this tremendous accomplishment will be shared in the Daily Eagle. A special thank you to our Sustainability Committee and everyone else who played a role in making this happen.

I look forward to celebrating Commencement with you next Friday.