I hope everyone had a relaxing long weekend. Now that we are unofficially in summer, it's hard to believe we are almost halfway through 2018! Hard to believe. What's not hard for me to believe - I'm not quite halfway through my review of the merit and promotion documents. Nonetheless, I will make it, I swear! I think I have made considerable progress over the last week. I'm reading every word so that I don't miss out on what everyone has been up to so it takes a bit of time to get through them. I need to talk with the Deans and see if they have a better process than the one I've been using. With the 2 to 3-yr review cycle used throughout UC, it makes for far more reviews than at other institutions. When I was on the College review committee at Michigan State, we had a record year one of the years, with 36 reviews but faculty (teaching, research and Extension) were only reviewed by the College at promotion to Associate or Full Professor (twice in one's career). As the demographic of ANR academics shifts to a more junior group the number may remain closer to the 92 dossiers there are this year because the cycle is 2 years early in the career before shifting to 3 year cycles.
Now I am in DC for a couple of days. This trip gives me a chance to meet with a number of the NIFA program leaders, including California's liaison. It's a quick trip; I'll fly back Wednesday night. When I get back there will be planning for the annual budget meeting with President Napolitano, an update on how the new IACUC partnership with UC Merced is going, and the monthly meeting with REC Directors followed by the monthly meeting with County Directors, among other meetings.
You may have seen Mark Lagrimini around – he arrived in California in early May. Friday, June 1, is his first official day. That makes us more than halfway to having a full team for programmatic leadership. While that still leaves a vacancy, I'll take it. I'm looking forward to working with the team of ‘Marks'.
The UC ANR Advisory Council has begun meeting. This is the ‘tiger team' that President Napolitano referred to in her remarks at the Statewide conference. So far, I believe, they've had a phone call. This Thursday they meet for the better part of the day. Glenda and Tu will be there providing requested information. I'm holding a late June date to meet with the Advisory Council. There's no further update at this time as we are primarily responding to information requests at this point. We'll see how things develop.
The academic positions put forward by the CD/REC directors (Advisor positions) and the campus associate deans (Specialist positions) should be posted soon. The 40 total positions have been identified so be on the lookout for an ANR Update. There were difficult decisions made. Given that we are just under halfway through the position proposal phase there are likely to be a few additions to the list before the final proposals go to Program Council for deliberation.
Welcome to Nicole Marshall-Wheeler who will be starting June 1 as 4-H Youth Development Advisor, based in Colusa, with programmatic responsibilities in Colusa, Sutter and Yuba Counties. Please make Nicole feel welcome and help her off to a great start!
Enjoy the remainder of our short week!