Hello, CALS colleagues,
Welcome to another great week of the fall semester! Each week of the year at Iowa State brings into focus the wonderful possibilities and outlook of our university and this college. I like to say that being “in education” means you are an optimist, as everything about education is about the future - making it as bright and vibrant as possible, notwithstanding the perpetual challenges in doing so. For land-grant universities, those opportunities and challenges were evident even in the debates in Congress in the 1850s and 1860s about what became our guiding document – the Morrill Act of 1862. If you’ve not read it, here is the Morrill Act (1862) in two short pages.
This past weekend, we had one of those events that each year truly brings into focus the optimism and possibility of our college – the terrific Family Weekend event planned and hosted by our CALS Office of Academic Innovation – notably Mary Clancy and the entire office team! As in recent years, the event was held on Saturday morning, Oct. 11, at Reiman Gardens. This year, we had the largest attendance anyone can remember, with over 400 attending. This two-plus-hour activity brings together leadership, faculty, staff, advisors and peer mentors from all our departments (great thanks to each of you!), with freshman students and their families who’ve made the trip here for the weekend. Some came from as far away as the Imperial Valley in California, just 10 miles from the Mexican border, and from south Texas, just a few miles from Corpus Christi. And, of course, we had students and families with us from every surrounding state and counties all over Iowa!
At the event, there were remarks in four separate sessions about the college, what it means to strive and thrive here, about the chosen curricula of each group of students, about the possibilities of scholarships and high-impact, value-added activities like Study Abroad and Study USA, undergraduate research and more, and terrific, inspiring remarks from the current CALS Council president Sam Martin, a senior in animal science. There was also an invite to all attending to make their way over to the Hansen Agriculture Student Learning Center for the 2025 Bacon Expo that took place Saturday, and then to enjoy Reiman Gardens' Spirits in the Gardens displays.
This coming week, we’ll have our annual fall CALS Town Hall on Wednesday, Oct. 15, from noon to 1 p.m. in 1131 National Swine Research and Information Center Building - please come out for that. Also, stop by the CALS Career Day or encourage your students to attend on Tuesday, Oct. 14, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Lied Recreation Athletic Center. There will be lots more going on as we move into the eighth week of the semester, and our students are deep into mid-term exams.
Very best - Dan
Scenes from CALS
