Dean's CornerSeptember 5, 2025
Dear Colleagues,
Each academic year begins with a flurry of activity, and this year is no different. College faculty, staff, and leadership have spearheaded initiatives to redesign classes, create new opportunities for research and learning, and create a dynamic academic community that fosters personal and professional inquiry and growth. While we continue to navigate the shifting national landscape of higher education, we remain grounded in our mission, vision, and values: to pursue knowledge through rigorous and innovative research and teaching so that all students, faculty, and staff have opportunities to learn, work, and grow personally, professionally, and intellectually.
I understand that this week’s message from interim President Sears was difficult news for many faculty, students, and staff in the college. I want to echo the point that our actions—how we conduct our research and teaching, envision the future of our departments and programs, and how we engage with our colleagues and students—will be the true measure of our commitment to maintaining an inclusive college community.
College leaders dedicated much of their time over the summer to initiatives to support teaching, research, and community building in Emory College and across the university.
Learning for Living Initiative
Divisional Dean Joe Crespino and Benjamin Reiss, Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of English, are co-principal investigators — along with Oxford colleagues Molly McGehee and Erin Tarver — on a project funded by the Teagle Foundation’s Cornerstone: Learning for Living initiative. This project will support faculty and students across the college by designing a common first-year seminar that can be taken by up to a third of first-year students, providing a gateway to other interdisciplinary, liberal arts seminars that will enrich the tradition of close reading and critical thinking that characterizes Emory’s liberal arts education. The grant also supports co-curricular activities that will extend students’ learning experiences and opportunities for social connections among students, faculty, and alumni.
Year of Compassion
College leaders worked this summer on the launch of the Year of Compassion, a year-long initiative led by the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics. This program builds on Emory’s 25-year collaboration with the Dalai Lama and the Emory-Tibet Science Initiative (ETSI) to highlight the deep, transdisciplinary connections that sustain research, teaching, and learning across the liberal arts. More information about the events and resources associated with the Year of Compassion will be shared widely in the upcoming weeks.
Research Funding Support
Senior Associate Dean Anita Corbett led the effort for the college to provide support to nearly twenty faculty whose external grants had been cancelled. The college allocated a total of approximately $80,000 in bridge-funding to support their ongoing research.
Professor Kimberly Belflower
Finally, thank you to Prof. Kimberly Belflower for serving as this year’s Convocation speaker, and a HUGE congratulations on her Broadway play John Proctor is the Villain, which received seven Tony Award nominations.
Emory College is home to truly outstanding faculty, students, and staff. Each of you makes important contributions to our community. By offering a broad range of perspectives, experiences, and questions, and by approaching each other with openness, respect, and a willingness to listen, you ensure that Emory College is a community where everyone can find a place to thrive.
Dean, Emory College of Arts and Sciences
Charles Howard Candler Professor of History
Emory University
