Dear faculty and staff,

A Happy New Year to all of you. I hope you all had a wonderful winter break. As we begin the 2025 spring semester with renewed energy, I want to bring a few important topics to your attention.

Academic reflections

2024 was, on all accounts, a very gratifying year. A selected few highlights are included here:

• Achieving R1: Faculty, staff, and students joined forces in large numbers to work on UAF's R1 efforts. UAF invested in student scholarships to pursue and complete Ph.D. degrees, faculty support to mentor students, and several other initiatives to recruit and graduate doctoral students. Check out my September 2024 message about capitalizing on the R1 momentum as well as the UAF R1 website, which has a wealth of information and updates on what UAF is doing to achieve R1.Ìý

• The UAF academic plan was enhanced with specific goals, and I will continue to update you on active efforts to meet these goals.

• In the fall 2024 catalog, we added a B.S. in energy resource engineering and a B.S. in wildlife ecology and society, and modernized several other academic programs through curricular updates. A complete list of program additions is available at the updated SLOA and program review site.

• UAF had an excellent accreditation year, maintaining its institutional accreditation as well as specialized accreditations. Vice Provost and Accreditation Liaison Officer Trent Sutton started preparing theÌý Policies, Regulations, and Financial Review report for UAF’s sixth year review with NWCCU, our institutional accrediting body.Ìý

• UAF saw a 4.1% increase in student headcount and a 5.2% increase in Student Credit Hours in fall 2024 compared to fall 2023. Our campuses were more vibrant as students engaged with in-person activities.Ìý

• The new Student Success Center, a one-stop service center for advising, tutoring, testing, writing, mathematics, speaking, career coaching, counseling and financial aid, located on the 6th floor of the Rasmuson Library on the Troth Yeddha’ campus was busy every day since its debut in August 2024. If you haven’t already done so, please pay a visit to the center this spring. Familiarize yourself with theÌý academic support resources (including study, meeting and classroom spaces), and encourage your students to make use of the services offered.

Looking forward to spring 2025

This fall, I received feedback from students on what worked well and what did not work so well for them in terms of their academic experiences. The most meaningful experiences were the ones where students felt like they were ‘seen,’ knew what was expected in the class, received meaningful feedback on their class assignments and had good engagement with their peers and instructors. The identified challenges included times when the instructor changed schedules, did not give timely feedback or was perceived to be disengaged. With this in mind, I have chosen to share some enrollment information, highlighting three actions you can take to promote student success at UAF.

Our enrollments continue to increase. Early enrollment reports from spring 2025 show that our student headcount is again up by 8.3% and SCH is up by 9.7% compared to the same time (about two weeks before the start of classes) last spring. It is important that we keep the student learning experience at the center of our efforts. As you update your teaching materials and pedagogy, please remember that the Center for Teaching and Learning has resources to help you prepare for the spring semester. There are some simple measures you can and must take to improve the student experience:

• Book adoptions: The best practice is to have a 100% book adoption at the time we open for registration for the next semester. Whether you plan to readopt a past book, or you have no required textbook for your course, it is important you enter this information in the . If the information on whether your course requires a book or not is included in the portal, a student will not be able to decide on whether to opt out of the B&N book bundle option or not. We are currently at an 88% adoption rate. Please use theÌý next few days to get this to 100% adoption. If you are not sure of what to do, please reach out to your dean’s office. They have a list of spring 2025 courses for which book adoptions are missing. Please email late adoptions to sm8514@bncollege.com.

• Syllabi: It is important that an up-to-date syllabus for your course is available for the students. As an example, I applaud the chemistry department for making syllabi for all their courses available to students on their website, making it simpler for students to make informed decisions during the registration period. Your syllabus lays the foundation for the expectations and commitments of both the faculty and the student. Over the past few years I have worked with the faculty senate and CTL and emphasized the importance of inclusive and good syllabi. Visit the CTL website to explore an excellent repository of syllabus resources. You can also (Jan. 8 at 10 a.m.) where you can work with an instructional team to update your syllabi. The faculty senate curriculum site also has a specific syllabus checklist, syllabus addendum, and sample syllabus statements on generative AI.

• Student feedback and Nanook Navigator alerts: It is important that students receive frequent and timely feedback on their homework assignments and academic performance. Academic advising staff are your partners in student success. If you see a student struggling in your class, please send an alert in Nanook Navigator to ensure that an advisor then reaches out and provides additional support to help the student get back on track. In addition, if you are mentoring graduate students, please check on your advisee to ensure that their graduate study plans and research advisory committee reports are complete, realistic, duly filed (the new deadline is March 15) and that the advisee is progressing as planned. Their study plan is the road map for the graduate student in their academic journey. Your timely feedback on the written drafts of thesis chapters or manuscripts is critical for graduate student success. As a reminder, graduate student writing support is now available at the Student Success Center.

Gardner Institute

On Jan. 8 there will be two informational sessions to learn more about UAF's 5-year partnership with the Gardner Institute: Transforming the Foundational Postsecondary Experience. The sessions will cover the partnership's goals, why UAF is involved, and details about the ongoing curricular analytics initiative. UAF leads will host the sessions, joined by Dr. Brent Drake and Dr. Brandon Smith of the Gardner Institute. Dr. Drake will discuss the partnership's overall vision, and Dr. Smith will provide insights into the curricular analytics work. Ample time will be provided for Q&A. I encourage you all to join one of these session options:

• In-person: Jan. 8, 11–11:45 a.m. in ELIF 401 (BP Design Theater),Ìý

• Via Zoom: Jan. 8, 1–1:45 p.m.

Academic calendar

The UAF academic calendar is now available on the Office of the Registrar website in an easy-to-use, searchable and subscribable format. Four important dates for you to keep in mind are:

• Jan. 13 (Monday): First day of instruction; add/drop period begins

• Jan. 20 (Monday): ÀÖ»¢Ö±²¥ Civil Rights Day (no classes, offices closed):Ìý Our Honors College Students will host an event on Tuesday Jan. 21 in the BP Design Theater to raise awareness of the importance of this day. Please be on the lookout for a separate announcement.

• Jan. 21 (Tuesday): This marks the start of the second week of classes and is a really important deadline. In this second week, students will require faculty approval to add all 100- and 200-level courses and any math or statistics course to their schedule. Students email their instructors to request permission. Instructors can approve students to enroll through UAOnline. For questions or help, faculty can email the Office of the Registrar at uaf-registrar@alaska.edu.

• Jan. 24 (Friday): Deadline for adding and dropping classes; 5 p.m. in person, 11:59 p.m. at UAOnline. This is the last day for student- and faculty-initiated drops with refund (course does not appear on academic record). The deadline for tuition and fee payment is 5 p.m. in person, and 11:59 p.m. at UAOnline. This is also the last day for students to opt out of the bookstore bundle, should they choose to do so.

Selected personnel updates

• Laura Conner was named interim vice chancellor for research.

• Madara Mason was named interim director of the Honors College.

Additional academic updates will be shared through the Cornerstone. I encourage you to look out for them. As always, should you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact your dean or me at aprakash@alaska.edu. Thank you for everything you do every day to make UAF a university of choice.

— Anupma Prakash, provost and executive vice chancellor