Hello, CALS,
Welcome to week two of the semester! I hope the first week went well and you enjoyed seeing our students fill the campus with energy. I had the opportunity last week to speak with the faculty of the Department of Statistics and the Department of Plant Pathology, Entomology and Microbiology, and at both meetings I gave them homework - to take a few minutes and go out to the main campus and just watch and enjoy the parade of students during class change. If your office does not look out onto main campus, and you only really get to see students in a classroom or by happenstance – take a few minutes and actually go out and see them on parade, and remind yourself of the anticipation and outlook these wonderful people bring to us, which is the fundamental reason any of us are here! So pull up your calendar and mark a time this week you’ll complete this homework, and maybe treat yourself to an ice cream from the ISU Creamery before you find a spot on any of the hundreds of parade routes on campus. Enjoy and be filled with renewed energy to do the work of Iowa State.
This week, don’t forget the Farm Progress Show in Boone (Aug. 30-Sept. 1), the Student Innovation Center open-house (Sept. 1, from 4-6 p.m.), including features in the CALS collaborative learning labs on the fourth floor, rooms 4227 and 4229, and so many other events on campus. Coming up on Saturday, Sept. 3, from 9 a.m. to noon is the CALS BBQ at the Hansen Agriculture Student Learning Center before the Iowa State football game. Please join us at this event for some great food and a terrific gathering of faculty, staff, friends, students, alums and partners from far-and-wide.
Have a great week. - Dan
Scenes from CALS
Associate Dean Carmen Bain, left, and Clara Kittleson, student services coordinator with Student Accessibility Services, were among the faculty and staff volunteers from across the university handing out apples, bananas and bottled water to students during the first week of classes. Lots of others from the college were doing the same elsewhere around campus last week.
Tom Brumm, agricultural and biosystems engineering, submitting this photo of a monarch caterpillar feeding on milkweed in a flower bed in his backyard. The milkweed, remnants from the winter greenhouse rearing program, came from Keith Bidne, a USDA technician in entomology. Keith told Tom this is a “big one” and will likely develop into a butterfly in time for the migration.
Pictured wearing a red shirt, our very own Mark Hargrove, chair and professor of biochemistry, biophysics and molecular biology, playing at the Ames Main Street Farmers Market on this past Saturday with the Iowa No Mountain Band.
