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Realizing Our Vision

September 09, 2011 College of Arts and Humanities

Bonnie Thornton Dill

Remarks by Dean Thornton Dill to faculty, staff and graduate students at the college's annual convocation ceremony.

 

 Remarks by Dean Thornton Dill to faculty, staff and graduate students at the college's annual convocation ceremony.

 

 The College of Arts and Humanities

 Office of Communications

 September 7, 2011, 4 PM

 Gildenhorn Recital Hall, Clarice Smith Center



 

 INTRODUCTION



 

 BUILDING COMMUNITY

 

 ADVANCING OUR COMMON PURPOSE

 Interdisciplinary Collaborations| Excellence through Diversity| Research & Scholarship

 

 CONCLUSION



 

 AnchorTHE DEAN: When commencement exercises ended in May, faculty, staff and continuing students in the College of Arts and Humanities were left wondering about our new beginning. As a community, we had spent a significant portion of the spring semester hosting and interviewing prospective candidates for the position of dean. We had celebrated fourteen years of leadership by our former dean, Jim Harris and we were ready for the transition. We had begun to imagine how it might look; worry about its implications; and strategize ways we would approach this newcomer with information and ideas. (As chair of WMST at the time, these were certainly my concerns.) It’s fair to say that the school year ended for most of us with more questions about the future of the college than answers.

 

 I want to thank those of you who nominated me for this post. In considering Provost Ann Wylie’s offer to me to become dean of the College of Arts and Humanities, I recalled those elements of the initial search that I found inspiring and that illuminated the unique possibilities of the college; the breadth and depth of innovative scholarship taking place in our departments, programs, centers and galleries; the advances faculty have introduced in teaching, research and scholarship; the quality and accomplishments of our students, and the intelligence and dedication of our staff. I thought about the challenging conditions under which all of us have worked over the past three years–with furloughs, no COLA or merit and diminishing resources–and I chose to take this job because I believe in this college, I want to help address its challenges, seize the opportunities that await us, and most of all, work with you to enable the College of Arts and Humanities to fulfill its mission and realize its goals.

 

Over the past two years, three documents have been developed in the college under the leadership of the dean’s staff and in collaboration with many faculty, staff and students. They are the mission statement, the vision statement and the booklet, Be Worldwise. Read together, these three documents are the guiding principles through which I seek to build the college over the next two years. During my tenure as dean I will work with you to assess our accomplishments against the ideals we’ve expressed and take action to realize our vision. 

 

 Realizing our Vision

 

 My remarks today should be taken as the beginning of an ongoing conversation; not just between me and you but among us all. As dean I will provide leadership, inspiration and support to move this process forward, but this collective vision requires collective work; work that I plan to facilitate through two broad, interdependent campaigns: Building Community and Advancing our Common Purpose.

 

 AnchorBuilding Community

 

 Building community is the first step in collective action. I use the term community to capture the importance of people and relationships, pooled knowledge, and common values. I do not use the term to erase or ignore our internal struggles for recognition and resources. My point here is that membership in our college community means that what happens to one of us, at some level, affects us all.

 

 People in the College of Arts and Humanities are our most indispensable resource. As dean, I want to begin by thanking you for persevering under the very difficult and challenging conditions of the past several years. For staff, who are in so many ways the face of the college –often the first person visitors meet–your pleasant demeanor and equanimity under pressure is invaluable. For graduate students, who negotiate that liminal space between student and faculty—you inspire undergraduates, your ideas energize faculty and your determination makes us proud. For faculty, your commitments and professionalism along with your passion for ideas and for finding answers to newly emerging questions excites and enlivens the institution. 

 

 As you know, the university and the college face continuing financial challenges—making it even more important that we build a community of care, concern and support for one another. As dean, I will be an ardent advocate for the arts and humanities generally and for the college, particularly in seeking an equitable share of university resources and the support necessary to sustain educational excellence. I will ask the Collegiate Council, APAC and the Administrative Council to deliberate these issues and develop plans that address problems such as salary compression, so that we may better prepare for the future.

 

 Part of the way we will build our community is by sharing information. We stand out among the university’s 13 colleges and schools in the breadth and variety of ways we create, assess and share knowledge. Our college is composed of units that would be considered traditional humanities; units focused on the study of languages, cultures and linguistics; units emphasizing the creative and performing arts, as well as a number that are explicitly interdisciplinary. We, therefore, have increased opportunities for cross-disciplinary research and teaching around issues and problems that are rooted in the quest to understand humanity—mind, spirit and culture.

 

 We will continue the Dean’s Lecture Series and cast an even broader net for ideas and collaborators. We encourage you to continue sharing news of your accomplishments with the college communications office so that we can disseminate it to broader audiences both within the college and larger UMD community. We welcome your suggestions and ideas about innovative ways to publicize and share our achievements.

 

 On the back of your program you will see an image that will be officially released this fall in the new college viewbook. The viewbook is an undergraduate recruitment tool created by the Office of Student Affairs and used to help illuminate for prospective students what it’s like to be part of the arts and humanities community here at Maryland. I took this image for the back of our program because it provides a visual and textual representation of who and what we are about as a college. The words represent “values central to the arts and humanities” and are explored in the booklet, Be Worldwise. As you can see, the words form an image of a human being.

 

 The values that we challenge our undergraduate students to explore; creativity, global understanding, diversity, compassion, and self-knowledge among others, are values that we must regularly reexamine as faculty, staff and graduate students. We cannot ask our students to step outside their comfort zones– try something new and open themselves to transformation–if we are not willing to do that ourselves. We must challenge ourselves to understand the complexity and variety of our college, especially those parts that are very different from ones with which we are most familiar. Engagement in these practices with our students and colleagues will enliven and strengthen our community, giving meaning and substance to our shared values. 

 

 Our ability to weather the challenges ahead will be facilitated by the strength of our community; by our care and concern for people and relationships; through more effective efforts in pooling our knowledge; and by living the shared values that we teach. 

 

 AnchorAdvancing our Common Purpose

 

 The second key element in realizing our vision is to advance our common purpose—identifying goals to which we can all contribute and which will characterize our distinctive identity. There are three goals that I want to focus on during my tenure as dean. They are: (1) Facilitating Interdisciplinary collaborations; (2) Achieving Excellence through Diversity; and (3) Supporting Research and Scholarship in the arts and humanities.  

 

 AnchorFacilitating Interdisciplinary Collaborations

 

 For some time, people in the college have expressed a desire to increase interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary and cross-disciplinary programs, opportunities and initiatives. Our vision statement speaks directly to this concern. In fact, the statement is explicit about our desire to be engaged in “setting the standard for vibrant cross-disciplinary intellectual communities.” 

 

 This interest in inter-, multi-, and cross-disciplinary scholarship and teaching is both essential and timely. As public discussion about the value of the arts and humanities continues, it is vital to our sustenance and progress that we frame conversations to illustrate the ways our work informs and explains the world’s complexities.  

 

 The college has taken some important steps in this direction. In addition to our nationally recognized interdisciplinary departments like American Studies and Women’s Studies, or centers such as the Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies, we also have a number of units in which multidisciplinary and cross-disciplinary work is blossoming. Examples are the new Michelle Smith Collaboratory for Visual Culture in Art History & Archaeology, the Center for the History of the New America in History, the university’s first NSF-IGERT grant awarded to the department of Linguistics in collaboration with at least nine other university colleges, departments and centers; the college’s Digital Cultures and Creativity  living and learning program with 135 first- and second-year students; the Department of Classics that is developing a new interdisciplinary major in classical humanities;  the Translation and Interpretation Program that is being developed in the Department of Communication; the merger of the Departments of Theatre and Dance into a School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies; and the successful collaboration between artists and poets that was exhibited as Poetic Aesthetic in the Art Gallery last spring. These are just a few examples of the dynamic and exciting work taking place in the college.

 

 I will further this work  by completing a full scale assessment of what we’ve already accomplished and engaging department chairs, faculty and students in developing and implementing a plan for expanding it; identifying and reducing institutional barriers where possible, and continuing to promote collaboration. 

 

 AnchorAchieving Excellence through Diversity

 

 First among the list of core values and principles in the university’s strategic plan is: “Build an Inclusive Community that is enriched by differences, brings together people from the widest array of backgrounds and perspectives and recognizes that excellence cannot be achieved without diversity.” I take literally and believe strongly that indeed, excellence cannot be achieved without diversity. In other words, when I look at our college as a whole and at its component parts—if I do not see diversity, I will think that we have not yet achieved the excellence we are capable of achieving. 

 

 When I speak about diversity, I think of structural inequalities; I think of underrepresented minorities; I think of women; I think of groups that have been systematically denied opportunity, discriminated against and excluded in the U.S. and globally. The U.S. context is particularly pertinent because of the history of this public institution and state in promoting separate and unequal education and because of our land-grant mission to serve the citizens of Maryland. As a first step, inclusion at Maryland means making a sincere and serious effort to bring into our midst members of groups that were excluded by policy, statute, practice, prejudice and benign neglect. This definition encompasses, therefore, not only racial and ethnic minorities, but women, and gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgender  and inter-sex people, disabled people and others who have been the subject of systematic discrimination. 

 

Beyond the U.S., we seek to make this campus more inclusive internationally. Structural inequalities between nations and among peoples within nations shape individual and group experiences and affect transnational flows of people, products and ideas. Thus it is incumbent upon us to insure that in our efforts to internationalize our curricula, faculty, and student bodies we do so in a way that also addresses structural inequalities across the globe.

 

The campus strategic plan for diversity calls for the university “to energetically renew its efforts in diversity.” To energetically renew the efforts of the College of Arts and Humanities in diversity, I will appoint, this fall a college diversity task force whose purpose will be to carefully examine diversity among faculty, staff, and students; and assess our work on recruitment, retention, climate, and mentoring identifying our accomplishments and making recommendations for future actions which I will begin to implement during my tenure as dean. I will also insure that the college is actively engage in the NSF Advance program that is an important partner in creating inclusive excellence at Maryland. 

 

 AnchorSupporting Research and Scholarship in the Arts and Humanities

 

 Emphasis on the vitality and value of the arts and humanities also requires that we recognize the limitations of state funding and simultaneously redouble our efforts to obtain equitable funding within the university as well as funding from sources external to the university. As our colleague English Professor Martha Nell Smith pointed out in her Distinguished Scholar-Teacher Lecture last year, we do ourselves a disservice if we accept the myth that the humanities cost but do not pay and/or we get caught in the trap of measuring our value only in dollars.

 

 It is now common wisdom that public universities must rely less on state dollars for support. In this era of fiscal austerity, the college faces many challenges, one of which is our desire to provide an environment which nurtures excellence and promotes the value and vitality of the arts and humanities–at the same time that we seek new ways to mine the competitive market for external grants, contracts and gifts–and strive to do so without losing our souls. To facilitate this process I am seeking resources to provide–within the Dean’s office– support to faculty in the preparation and development of external grants and contracts. I do this not because I want our agendas to be driven by the priorities of external funders, but because I recognize that obtaining external grants is challenging in the arts and humanities. Even more important than the financial benefits, is the extent to which external grants will help us expand knowledge in the arts and humanities, magnifying its impact and visibility. I want to provide support for good ideas, and for studying, teaching and disseminating them. Grants are one of the mechanisms that make this possible, and it is incumbent upon us to mine every available opportunity. 

 

 AnchorConclusion

 

 At the outset of my talk, I said I wanted this to be the beginning of a conversation—a conversation that will take place on many levels among multiple groups of people. My strategy for realizing our mission and vision is simple; building community through a focus on people and relationships; pooled knowledge and common values and advancing our common purpose by facilitating interdisciplinary collaborations; renewing our efforts to achieve excellence through diversity and providing support for research and scholarship in the arts and humanities. I hope there’s something in this talk that resonates in one way or another for each of you; something that will create some discussion, some debate —some buzz and most of all, some definitive actions. I hope it will inspire and reignite your commitment to the goals of this college and lead you to get even more involved in the collective work of realizing our vision.  

                   

 

 Thank you for your time and attention and now…Let’s party!



 

 (Applause)



 

 END