November 2021 Announcements

• Stay up-to-date on all university COVID-19 updates and reminders. Read the latest message to the NC State community and review the Protect the Pack website regularly.
• NC State has officially launched the Genetics and Genomics Academy. The academy represents a universitywide, interdisciplinary effort to engage faculty, staff, undergraduate and graduate students in harnessing the power of science to serve society. The Genetics and Genomics Academy will strengthen the university’s graduate-level education and research initiatives and add undergraduate courses and other opportunities for campuswide engagement in genetics and genomics. Fred Gould has been named executive director of the Genetics and Genomics Academy, effective November 1. 
• All members of the NC State community are being asked to review and provide feedback on the Post COVID-19 Innovation Task Force executive summary and individual task force reports (Instruction and Student Support, Research, How We Work, and Digital Transformation). This feedback will be valuable in determining what changes to implement and best practices for doing so. Further information on the task forces and the four reports can be found on the 2021 Post COVID-19 Innovation Task Force website. The deadline for providing responses has been extended to Friday, November 12.
• NC State’s inaugural Equity Research Symposium will be held February 8, 2022 from 8:30 a.m.-6 p.m., both virtually and in Talley Student Union. The symposium will engage participants in contemplating the question “what does equity mean to me?” throughout the day and will feature panel presentations, lightning-rod presentations, poster presentations, and round table discussions. If you are interested in presenting at the symposium, please submit the title of the session, the name(s) of the presenter(s), type of presentation, and a brief abstract (up to 250 words), by November 23 using this form.
• Submissions are now being accepted for pre-proposals for NC State’s next Quality Enhancement Plan, which will focus on student success. Members of the campus community are invited to workshops providing additional information that may be helpful in developing a pre-proposal.  Pre-proposals are due by midnight on Friday, January 14, 2022, and must be submitted using the online QEP Pre-Proposal submission form. For more information, visit the QEP website or contact quality-enhancement-plan@ncsu.edu if you have any questions.

Administrator Updates

• An open search for the senior vice provost for instructional programs is underway. The nomination committee is chaired by Senior Vice Provost for Faculty and Academic Affairs. As previously announced, Senior Vice Provost for Academic Strategy and Resource Management and Chief of Staff Duane Larick will be retiring effective Jan. 1. In light of this change, the Provost’s Office will be undergoing several other organizational changes soon. The senior vice provost for instructional programs will be responsible for the academic strategy portion of Larick’s role. Courtney Thornton, previously the vice provost for strategic planning and institutional effectiveness at North Carolina A&T State University and former associate vice provost for academic personnel and policy at NC State, has recently been appointed to become interim senior vice provost for instructional programs, effective Dec. 1. Stay up to date on the search by visiting the search page on the Provost’s Office website or go.ncsu.edu/svp-ip-search.
• Dean of the College of Education search: The nomination committee held its first meeting on Sep. 24 and meets on Nov. 17 for a recruitment check-in. Stay up to date on the search by visiting the search page on the Provost’s Office website or go.ncsu.edu/ced-search.
• Dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine search: A recruitment check-in meeting took place on Oct. 28. The nomination committee meets in early December for a mid-search review. Stay up to date on the search by visiting the search page on the Provost’s Office website or go.ncsu.edu/cvm-search.

From DELTA:

• DELTA is offering spring 2022 Express Grants — Rapid Design and Instructional Tools — for faculty and instructors seeking ways to enhance their teaching with technology. Apply from Nov. 1-19, 2021.
• Hybrid-Flexible course design (HyFlex), offers students the choice to participate in-person, online synchronously or online asynchronously. Faculty Fellow Sarah Khan shares her perspective from a HyFlex Classroom.
• Rethinking Course Design: An Agile Learning Environment Perspective is a course design workshop that will focus on tips and tricks from the Agile perspective, what challenges an Agile course design can address, and how it can benefit the instructor and the learner in the short and long run. Register now!
• DELTA has led NC State’s transition from Mediasite to Panopto as the university’s main video management tool since May 2021. DELTA now needs the help of faculty to ensure all video content is converted to Panopto and accessible to students for the upcoming academic year.
• Learn more about how FM 425: Feed Manufacturing Technology worked with a DELTA team to convert labs into web-based 3D apps allowing students to see inside the feed mills.
• Technology Commercialization Counselor Michael Carnes reached out to DELTA to pivot his team’s in-person workshops, which involved six panelists and 225 attendees, into a virtual webinar with support from DELTA. Discover more about the collaboration!
• Peter Koutroumpis recently earned Quality Matters course certification for his HESF 102: Fitness Walking course. Read more from Koutrompis on his experience working with DELTA and how the newly QM-certified course will impact students.

From the Office for Faculty Excellence:

• Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Warwick Arden is pleased to invite nominations for the Provost’s Faculty Fellows Program for fall 2022. The program is designed for current NC State faculty who are interested in learning more about academic affairs administration at the university, in developing their skills as faculty leaders, and in working closely with Provost’s Office staff on projects that are meaningful to them and to the university. Up to six faculty fellows will be selected and their departments will be provided with 25% salary release funds to cover the time commitment required for participation. Fellowships are for two semesters: Fall 2022 and Spring 2023. Applications are due via email to Jonathan Holloway, OFE Program Coordinator, by 5 p.m. on Wednesday, November 17.

From the Office of Global Engagement:

• Learn more about two high school acquaintances who became college sweethearts at NC State and traveled the world.
• NC State Global has refreshed their website. Check it out at https://global.ncsu.edu/. 
• Global 3D sessions provide a platform to discuss, discover and develop synergies on specific topics of interest to faculty and staff. An upcoming session on Friday, November 19 from 10-11 a.m. will offer an introduction to the academic opportunities associated with the United Nation’s sustainable development goals and a chance to weigh in on their development. It will include a brief overview of the SDG course inventory created by Seth Murray and an undergraduate student research team and an introduction to the Academics Working Group of the Sustainability Council and their objectives by Christopher Galik, co-chair of the group.  

From the Office of Information Technology:

• To commemorate 10 years of Google on NC State’s campus, the Office of Information Technology invites the campus community to attend “The Evolution of Google Workspace” on Thursday, Nov. 11 at 2 p.m. online.

Ken Matthews, Google Solutions engineer, will discuss the past, present and future of Google in higher education. There will be time for questions and answers as well as Google door prizes. To attend, add this Zoom session to your calendar. Registration is not required.

• The next proposed extended maintenance windows that can impact IT services are scheduled on: February 5-6; April 2-3; and July 9-10, 2022. If you have any questions regarding these maintenance windows, contact the NC State Help Desk via the NC State IT Service Portal or call 919.515.4357 (HELP). For IT maintenance updates, view Service Status on the NC State IT Service Portal.

From Outreach and Engagement

• The Strengthening The Impact of Research (STIR) program seeks to enhance NC State’s capacity to design and conduct research with broad impacts on society by creating and supporting yearly cohorts of NC State Impact Scholars. Each group of 10-12 selected Impact Scholars will attend a series of five, two-hour workshops in the spring to strengthen their capacity to create innovative research impacts on society and write more competitive grant proposals. Impact Scholars will also design and implement a project of their own, and conduct a Research Impacts workshop in their department. With support from the Office of Outreach and Engagement, Impact Scholars will receive up to $1,000 to support their project expenses. STIR is now accepting applications for the 2022 cohort, with an application deadline of December 3.