This Fall we will welcome over 130 new permanent faculty to WSU, the result of an aggressive hiring plan executed by our 10 academic colleges. Fran McSweeney, Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs and resident academic historian, believes this class to be the largest one in recent memory (and perhaps the largest in the history of WSU). The addition of these faculty should put our total faculty size at levels above those prior to the Great Recession and the loss of over 50 percent of our state allocation.
There is no better way to bring new life to a university community, college, or department than to infuse energetic, highly talented faculty. Obviously, the new faculty provide welcome relief to a faculty stretched to teach a growing undergraduate student body. Equally significant are the scholarly contributions that these faculty will make to advance our goal of achieving an AAU research profile.
As I have had the opportunity to meet these new faculty and reviewed their vitae and related materials, one cannot be anything but impressed. They represent a nice blend of new assistant professors and experienced, tenured mid-career faculty. The junior faculty come from graduate programs and post-doctoral appointments at some of the most prestigious universities in the world. Several of the mid-career faculty hired in STEM disciplines are transferring significant competitive federally funded projects with them to WSU. There is no doubt that we will feel an immediate impact of having all of these talented scholars on board.
As we welcome these new faculty to all of our campuses, let us all be vigilant in assuring that they have a quality onboarding experience that initiates a stellar career at WSU. Our challenge will be to provide the resources they need to be productive, an intellectual environment where they thrive, and to continue to recruit the best and brightest year after year. Thank you for all your efforts in this fundamental endeavor that will take WSU to its aspiration of being one of the nation’s premiere land-grant universities.