Dear Friends,

Suddenly it’s October, and the greeting I wanted to send out as a start to the academic year is feeling a little tardy. That said, those of you who are on campus know that we’ve had a very busy start to the academic year, and perhaps we are just now finding our pace. So I will keep this first “reflection” short!

I want to start by acknowledging that my reflections will have a slightly different focus this year. I plan to use them not only to reveal some of the great work that’s happening on campus and how it connects to broad movements in higher education, but also to acknowledge Simmons faculty accomplishments.

Although we are not publishing In the Loop anymore, we are still collecting important faculty news items and sharing them online each month. We've created a new form that will allow you to submit the kind of information that you used to submit for In the Loop. In addition to the monthly Faculty News blog posts, these items will also be used for the yearly Faculty Scholarship booklet published in the spring. I plan to include—starting with my next “reflection”—some highlights of what faculty members are engaged in.

First year students line up to process to Convocation. Photo by Kristie Gillooly

At our opening Convocation, I acknowledged that Simmons is in a time of excitement and change. We are completing the last year of a strategic plan aimed at 2015 and using this year to develop a vision and plan for 2020. We are investigating curricular changes in our undergraduate program, exploring the ways leadership development can be foundational to the Simmons educational experience, and forging links between the curriculum and the co-curriculum, between the theoretical and the practical, between the life of the mind and the life of work and service. If I had to name the single quality essential to Simmons College right now, it would be momentum.

The academic campus, in preparation for the beginning of the academic year. Photo by Diane Hammer

I told the community at Convocation that I’ve been thinking a lot about momentum lately—about the actual mechanics of linear momentum as well as about motion, in general, as a metaphor for the processes of change I am observing throughout the college. And I shared one of my favorite poems by Michael Donaghy, “Machines,” to illustrate my points. I enjoyed putting poetry and physics together on that occasion. In many ways, the Convocation address was my first "reflection" this year.

Deans Judy Beal, Cathy Minehan, Renée White, Eileen Abels, Suzanne Sankar, and me in blue!
Photo by Diane Hammer

On that day I did acknowledge that I am so thankful for the welcome I’ve received and continue to receive at Simmons. And I shared my gratitude for the commitment I see, every day, in the people who work in this community. I see it in their dedication to our students, and in the ways they show up and quietly, consistently, modestly, keep the invisible machinery of this place working. So, as we launch a new academic year, I hope we can keep our momentum, all of us in motion together, moving in the same direction. I hope you will join me with a sense of new beginnings or renewed commitments, ready to work toward the common goals that we have begun to articulate.

All the best,

P.S.: Faculty, don't forget to submit your accomplishments!