Alan Grant, dean
Dear colleagues,
I encourage everyone to view Provost Rikakis’ recent presentation related to the proposed destination areas and the Beyond Boundaries initiative. The link is in the provost’s Feb. 16 email message to the university community, or you can access it by going to the Beyond Boundaries website.
Provost Rikakis has outlined a broad road map for further developing five interrelated destination area themes. The development of these themes as well as the connection to the overall Beyond Boundaries visioning process are detailed in the presentation. Faculty members will refine the proposed destination areas through a series of workshops in the coming weeks. CALS will continue its involvement and has an opportunity for significant involvement in these areas that are now receiving immediate attention. Small groups of faculty members are being invited to be a part of the university-level discussions and workshops to further define the overall missions of the five destination areas. Later in the spring after the areas have been further refined, workshops will be opened to all faculty members interested in these five areas. Additional destination areas will also be considered for development in the future.
As explained in the presentation, the destination areas will also be early steps in charting the courses that will be described in the Beyond Boundaries initiative. Many faculty and staff members have provided input for the Beyond Boundaries discussions. I refer you to the letter, originally in the Feb. 5 Virginia Tech daily email, for some updates to the Beyond Boundaries initiative. Also, watch for updates in the Campus Notices section of the Virginia Tech Daily news email. For example, updates were included from the Preparing Students for the Future group on Feb. 24 and from the Campus of the Future group on Feb. 25.
Sincerely,
Alan Grant
Dean