Some personal news

A sabbatical for the first half of 2025

Big news! I have been fortunate enough to have been granted a sabbatical for the spring semester to work on a few research projects! I am officially on sabbatical from January 1 through June 30 and will resume my duties as dean on July 1, 2025.

How does a sitting dean get a sabbatical?

This is not common and a bit complicated.

I approached Provost Ramsaran and President Green with the idea back in early 2023. They were both supportive which is amazing and wasn’t a given. As many of my dean friends will attest - getting a sabbatical as a dean is not common. I know of a couple cases, but not many. This is different from faculty members taking a sabbatical, when the main complication is figuring out alternative people to cover classes.

Because I’m a dean, there were details to figure out. First and foremost, we needed someone to serve as interim dean. Thankfully, Dr. Emma Fleck agreed to do this and she will be amazing. Beyond that, we also had to determine what duties I would have during sabbatical (being available to meet with Dr. Fleck for advice, some alumni relations work, and still supervising one office). I’ll likely have a few hours per week of work to keep things going smoothly, but with Dr. Fleck in charge and our great team, I expect things will be smooth.

Why am I excited?

For me, the timing is great. I have served as the of dean of the Sigmund Weis School of Business since May 2017. This role is something I absolutely love but it is big job and reduces time for other things I’ve also loved doing - like teaching and research. I have kept my toe in both of these areas, but it’s been tough to do too much given that’s not my main “day job”.

I am incredibly excited to have focused time in the first half of 2025 for these passions.

The sabbatical will allow me to work on several research papers along with a book project. I will share some of the results throughout the upcoming months! (For hints on a couple of the research areas, check out the photos!)

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