Colleagues, thank you again for the opportunity to share updates with this group.
Let me begin with a bit of follow up to the September meeting and a question about how retired and emeritus faculty can participate in the academic life of our campus. I want to confirm that these are local decisions within the academic units but may include opportunities such as serving on dissertation committees. For those interested, I encourage you to speak with the leadership of your home department to learn more.
I also would like to extend a word of appreciation to Bill Ramos and Danielle DeSawal. At my request, they co-chaired a task force to work toward a Campus Policy Committee for Bloomington. Their charge was to review current processes for policy development, communication, and maintenance. They have made significant progress on a draft report that includes detailed workflows for both campus policy and campus procedure development. Their work will be shared with various groups for review and input later this semester. Many thanks to Bill, Danielle, and task force members Jeremy Allen, Dana Anderson, John Cioriari, Carrie Doughtery, Jamie Gayer, Jeff Goetz, Lamar Hylton, Dan Li, Chase McCoy, Bryan Orthel, and Todd Royer for their thoughtful and detailed work.
Another group of colleagues is working to create campus programming to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration with events over the course of spring semester leading up to July. As I trust you are aware, our own Lilly Library is the steward to one of 26 known copies of a Dunlap broadside, a reproduction of the Declaration printed the evening of July 4, 1776. This will, of course, be the centerpiece of our activities.
All of the events will engage people across our campus and even in the community with a goal of creating both a common experience and also to reflect on the principles and importance of the Declaration. Details are still in progress, but I anticipate a number of opportunities to connect around these topics.
With that in mind, I hope this group will consider how we can ensure that these events serve our educational mission. We have an obligation to prepare students to be work ready, life ready, and citizen ready. As we think about how to position them to be informed and engaged citizens in their communities, this is a moment to embrace. Last month, I asked this group to consider how we ensure that our students develop their civic literacy. Making sure that our students recognize not just the anniversary but that they also develop an understanding of the document it celebrates is an important moment in their education at IUB. If you have thoughts on how best to incorporate the anniversary into our students’ education, please share them with me.
Last month, I also asked for your assistance last month regarding mentoring of our students. As I have said, all of us have had our lives shaped by mentors whose time, interest, and wisdom have guided us. I have every confidence that many of you are serving in that capacity today. My hope is that we can come together in an organized way to make meaningful faculty mentoring a defining feature of an IUB education.
Again, I hope this group will devote some energy to the topic of mentoring this year.
I continue to join colleagues among our faculty and staff weekly for lunches in the Tudor Room. Those are always good conversations, and I appreciate the candor and the abiding affection for our campus that are part of each of those meals. In early November, we will share a schedule and opportunity to sign up for spring semester lunches. I encourage you to consider joining me, if it is of interest.
With that, let me conclude by thanking you for your commitment to our campus and to working to always lift up Indiana University Bloomington among the most important public research universities in American.