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January 26, 2024

Dear friends,

How strange yet fitting that the first day of classes on Wednesday held the promise of spring in the air. Of course, it is a promise deferred for a few more months, but it was a beautiful day for a fresh start, and start we did. You all have been up to something across campus, in your classrooms, offices, common spaces and picnic tables all around. You’ve been engaging the minds and imaginations of our students, hard at work at the business of learning, exploring, discovering.

I have a short and sweet message for you this week. But I’m not worried because something tells me you will shrewdly and swiftly find something else with which to occupy your valuable Friday time once you’ve read this (including the tasty tidbit below the line).

• Yesterday evening, we welcomed many of you to Ewell Hall for a wonderful celebration to kick off the spring semester. It was great to see you. You ate all our food and polished off almost all the wine, which just tells me we need to order more for next year (and more….and more….).
• President Rowe shared the university’s 2023 Financial Report, a wonderful update highlighting the vibrant vision and artful achievements of the 2023 calendar year. If you haven’t yet, I encourage you to take some time to review it and join me in a moment of reflection and pride in a remarkable year for W&M.
• I met with the Future of Arts & Sciences committee earlier this week and I would again like to extend my appreciation to them for the work they are undertaking this semester. Please be on the lookout for communications from the committee, co-chaired by Hannah Rosen
  associate professor of history and American studies, and Matthias Leu, associate professor of biology, and opportunities to share your input and ideas for the future of A&S.
• A warm welcome to Eric Despard, new executive director of the Arts Quarter, who is now among us! Eric is already a wonderful addition to the team and the greater W&M community.
• The Charles Center is accepting applications for Community of Scholars, May Seminars, and Study Away grants, which are featured on the center's Faculty Support page. 
• As a reminder, last week I sent out the consolidated call for Spring 2024 Professorships (Cummings and Chancellor Professor; W. Taylor Reveley, III Interdisciplinary Faculty Fellowship). Please take note of the relevant deadlines for submission of nominations and creating Blackboard dossier sites.
• The Provost has also called for nominations for the University Professor of Teaching Excellence and the University Professor of Teaching Excellence. The University Professor for Teaching Excellence Award recognizes faculty who demonstrate and sustain excellence in teaching with a commitment to inclusive teaching; the University Professor for Research Excellence Award recognizes faculty impact in scholarship. For more information about each award and its criteria, please visit their respective webpages. Materials for both awards should be submitted directly to the Provost’s office by 5:00 p.m. on Friday, February 2, 2024. Please pay particular attention to the deadlines for each professorship or fellowship, as well as where final packets should be submitted.
• The FRC Faculty Research Grant Call for Proposals is available, with proposals due February 5, 2024. This is NOT the same as the A&S Faculty Grants Fund (the next deadline for which is March 15, 2024). The FRC Faculty Research internal grant program provides funds for research activities and is administered by the Faculty Research Committee (FRC). The FRC plans to fund up to 50 one-year awards at $5,000 per award. Notification of award and funds availability comes in early April 2024. The proposal due date is February 5, 2024.

I often spend time during the week mulling over what might go below the line. This week, it suddenly became sunny and there was more yellow in the environment than I have been accustomed to. So below the line this week is a meditation on yellow.

• When I was a teenager, I was enamored of someone who introduced me to the song “Mellow Yellow” by Donovan. What does it mean? It was the 70s and no-one cared. But just look at the genius of the lyrics. “If you want, your cup I will fill.” They don’t make them like that any more.
• Next (and a go-to for Friday messages), paint names. Macaroon, Parmesean [sic], Saffron (of course, because I’m just mad about saffron), Trombone (weird), Light Yellow (inspired), Clover Lime (?), Unmellow Yellow (hey….).
• A yellow joke. It’s mellow. It’s saffron. And it’s not that funny.
  • Why did the yellow potato quit the gym? Because it couldn’t lift its yam.
• And finally, the first lines of the poem Yellow by John Hollander:
  • Dirty gold sublimed from the black earth up
    In bright air: these are the awaited stalks.

We await the stalks.

Have a great weekend, everyone.

Take care,

Suzanne

Suzanne Raitt
Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Chancellor Professor of English
Pronouns: she/her/hers