Chancellor’s Update

Welcome back! The weather may not feel like it but “spring” semester is here.

On Monday, January 12^th, UTC celebrated its classification as a Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Community Engaged University. UTC is one of only 361 universities in the country honored for community connections and partnerships. This is an acknowledgement of the hard work of the entire campus and also of the Carnegie Reapplication Committee chaired by Dr. Deborah Arfken. Thank you, Dr. Arfken, and all of the committee members: Karen Adsit, Dee Dee Anderson, Chuck Cantrell, Bengt Carlson, Sandy Cole, Terry Denniston, Tyler Forrest, Richard Gruetzemacher, Chris Horne, Linda Johnston, Meredith Perry and Deborah Montgomery, administrative support. I appreciate all of your hard work.

UTC has two highly ranked programs listed in the recently-announced U.S. News and World Report 2015-2016 rankings for online education! The College of Engineering and Computer Science is ranked in the top ten Best Online Graduate Engineering programs and the College of Business is ranked in the top fifty Best Online MBA programs. In addition, RNtoBSN.org just released a ranking of RN to BSN Nursing programs and UTC is ranked 6^th in the country. Our colleagues are clearly doing great things!

The grand opening of our new library is Thursday, January 29^th. In addition to inviting students, faculty, staff, and alumni, we have also invited the Chattanooga community to see this amazing new facility. It has been a long time coming and I’m thrilled that it is now open. The event on January 29^th will be held from 3-7 p.m. and will include tours, refreshments, entertainment and a ribbon cutting and remarks at 5:30 p.m. You are invited – please join us for the celebration. RSVP with an e-mail to ChancellorEvents@utc.edu.

Meetings are being held this week for faculty, staff and students to discuss the Interim Policy on Sexual Misconduct and Relationship Violence that went into effect on Monday, January 5^th. The policy has been developed over the last 8 months. If you were not able to attend a meeting to provide feedback in person, please do so online at http://www.utc.edu/sexual-misconduct/ (a comment box is located at the bottom of the page). We need your input to develop the final draft that will be considered by the UT Board of Trustees at its June meeting.

This Monday is Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day honoring his legacy of championing a set of ideals that empower people no matter their background or ethnicity. This past Monday, January 12^th, we honored Dr. King on our campus with a series of events including keynote speaker Jeff Johnson. The day started with a breakfast and an inspiring speech from Mr. Johnson, who later met with local high school students. As you enjoy your holiday, think about how you are going to help build a stronger sense of community and inclusion in the coming year. We each have a role to play and together we can do this.