The AGNR Alumni Weekend Tailgate was a fun time! Over 300 people registered representing: 170 current students, mostly freshmen and sophomores, and their families plus 120 alums and their guests! The weather could not have been better. Thanks to our faculty and staff who welcomed our friends, particularly newer students and their families who are just getting to know us! A special thanks to Tom Flores and Rohan Tikekar for providing an optional tour of the new fermentation lab. There was quite a group lined up to take advantage of the tour. I spoke to several parents who were grateful for the event.
The ‘Meet & Greets’ are over but I am fortunate to continue to have opportunities to meet with members of AGNR. I look forward to seeing a good turnout of AGNR faculty and staff at our Oktoberfest event this week. On Monday I met with the Entomology department and I have a few more departmental faculty meetings to attend this semester. I host my first faculty lunch this week and look forward to meeting with the 10 participants. We will be doing this monthly so those not selected for this month are encouraged to volunteer in future months when the dates fit your schedules. For those outside of College Park, every other month the meeting will be a virtual gathering. I am eager to establish a similar approach to connect with staff across AGNR. The goal is to have open lines of communication and work together to achieve great things.
Several of the AGNR Leadership Team made a trip to DC this week to meet with prospective international partners. Thanks to Jimmy Smith for his efforts and working his network to identify contacts with whom we can work to expand our impact by leveraging expertise. We can be a great partner for institutions around the world. At the same time, we can benefit from their expertise and relationships.
I enjoyed attending the president’s retreat last week. It was a day and a half of brainstorming. I gained greater clarity that AGNR is a relatively small fish in a big pond. That screams ‘opportunity’ to me! We left with homework – never my favorite thing – but I am excited to pursue some ideas over the next month that will position AGNR, and our impact, well for the future.
I hope you are enjoying the hints of fall, interspersed with remnants of summer. In totality, it’s all good!