I spoke with a UC ANR academic last week who was struggling to find time to work on a manuscript. I'm faced with the same challenge and have the same 2 manuscripts in my backpack that were there last week. I need a transcontinental flight (roundtrip) to work through them. These short Southwest flights don't seem to translate to getting any work done. In order to make progress on the manuscript I need to write, I first need time to think. Know the feeling? But it continues to amaze me how those across UC ANR do find time to publish their work. I received a new letter from the Journal of Extension congratulating the UC ANR authors published in the current issue. I say ‘new letter' because it seems we have authors in just about every issue – quite impressive!

When I arrived at the office this morning, I found a Western SARE newsletter. In it was a welcome to Jeff Stackhouse and Sonja Brodt, the new co-coordinators for the California SARE Professional Development Program, replacing Morgan Doran. Congratulations to both Sonja and Jeff and thanks to Morgan for all of his efforts in the role! The issue also contained a list of grants that were approved back in February. California received 6 of the 34 grants awarded, 2 of which went to UC Davis for a nice portion of the $2 million total award. Professional Development, Professional + Producer, and Farmer/Rancher grant programs are open if you have an idea that would fit the Western SARE program. Given the range of topics in the recent newsletter (medusahead, birds as pests on dairy farms, soil health, ag biodiversity, technical skill development of academics) many of our programs could be a good fit.

Today really seemed to focus on academic excellence. I spent much of the day in a workshop attended by administrators throughout the UC system (mostly Vice Chancellors for Research) to talk about how best to achieve collective excellence in undergraduate research. President Napolitano laid out the goal which is to engage every undergraduate student in the UC system in research. One of the quick themes to emerge was finite capacity to do this on the campuses because of student to faculty ratios. That's where UC ANR and other research units within UC but external to campuses can play a large role. Undergraduate students represent the future academics of UC ANR not to mention recipients of and advocates for our programs. It would be nice to see a greater portion of the UC undergraduate students familiar with what UC ANR does in their communities and there was strong interest at the meeting to develop some sort of formalized program across UC whereby UC ANR is involved in providing applied research experiences to undergraduate students. A summer internship program at my former institution proved a successful method of providing summer research support to projects around the state, for-credit research experiences for students needing those credits, paid employment for the students in their home areas and a cadre of Extension supporters, most of whom had never heard of it previously. A few even continued on to earn Master's degrees for future employment in Extension. I'd be curious to learn if there was interest in UC ANR in mentoring undergraduate students engaged in our research efforts.

Now it's off to San Diego for the first of the 5 information sessions. I believe this one has checked in full. I am looking forward to the conversations and meeting more of the people that make UC ANR all that it is.