With Fat Bear Week behind us, this week we celebrate National 4-H Week! We are immensely proud of our 4-H youth, volunteers, and program personnel of past and present. Many do not recognize that 4-H is the largest youth development organization in the country. In Maryland, it is offered in rural and urban areas alike. The impacts of are so strong, more than 50 countries around the world have modeled their programs after 4-H. If you aren’t familiar, it’s worth taking the time to learn more.
Did you see the announcement about the new Carnegie Mellon University campus to be built and staffed in Miami? By the time the buildings are constructed and all personnel are hired, the funds will be spent or endowed. What excites me is the learning model to be deployed where learning and inquiry are organized around societal challenges, such as human health and biological discovery; national security and strategic capabilities; energy and climate resilience; and advanced manufacturing and industrial transformation. Students will work in interdisciplinary teams alongside researchers, industry leaders and government partners. It’s a very different approach, but one I foresee as evolving to be of strong interest to prospective students exploring higher education options.
This week I am spending time with partners through events like the Governor’s Cookout and a trip to visit a farm focused on building workforce opportunities for veterans. The AGNR Leadership team meets on Wednesday, and I have several meetings with individual team members. I meet with the AREC department and a few faculty that are working on special projects for the college. Some of our partners attended the Volunteer Summit last week, which was a good opportunity to catch up with them.
I am taking an extended fall break, leaving at the end of this week and returning to the office on Wednesday of next week. It’s hard to believe we are already to fall break! I hope everyone takes advantage of it to either catch up on things or have some down time. In my case, it’s a bit of both including a hiatus of this weekly post until October 20. Get out and enjoy!