Key Messages

Black History Month is a time to honor the heritage, accomplishments, and immense contributions of Black Americans and Black communities, locally and across the nation. It also provides a reminder to recommit ourselves to creating a more inclusive, equitable and just future.

We hope you will attend the lecture planned in honor of Black History Month today, Feb. 8, at 7 p.m. in the Alumni Field House. Minnijean Brown-Trickey, an American political figure and one of the members of the Little Rock Nine, will deliver a keynote focused on the continued struggle for civil rights.

The Center for Racial Justice and Inclusive Excellence is also hosting an art exhibit for Black History Month. The exhibit, Our Votes, Our Stories, was created by students from the Cooperstown Graduate Program and is on display in Lee Hall. All are invited to attend the opening reception in the Freedom Room today, Feb. 8, at 3:30 p.m.

In addition, organizations across campus have planned a full slate of programming related to Black History Month. Check out the events on CampusConnection.

This year, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History's (ASALH) theme for Black History Month is "African Americans and the Arts." The ASALH hosts a month-long virtual festival that recognizes African Americans in the arts in the past, present and future. SUNY Chancellor John B. King and the SUNY Board of Trustees released a statement on Black History Month relating to the ASALH's theme.

We hope to see you at one of the many events and encourage you to explore the opportunities to learn about and celebrate Black history and achievement this month and throughout the year.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President

Dear Red Dragons,

Welcome Back! I hope you enjoyed time over winter break to rest and connect with those you love. The Spring 2024 semester will offer opportunities to learn, grow, and influence the future of our university together.

More than 140 new Red Dragons are joining us this semester. Welcome! Additionally, prospective students applying to enroll next fall will be on campus throughout the semester as they decide if SUNY Oneonta is the right fit. I know our welcoming community and the many achievements of our students, faculty and staff will show them what a wonderful place our university is.

As always, there is a lot planned for the Spring 2024 semester. The events calendar is full of club meetings, trips, performances, athletic competitions, wellness classes, entertainment events and more. Check out the Campus Connection Events card in myOneonta for a complete list of scheduled activities. We are also continuing with our strategic planning process as we set goals to help guide our actions for continued success over the next ten years.

I want to thank everyone for their continuous support of one another. Extending kindness to our fellow Red Dragons is a true hallmark of a strong community. Continuing to care for ourselves and each other will be critical to our success - individually and as a university. You can find resources for health and wellness support on the Health Center and Counseling Center webpages. If you ever have concerns about campus climate issues, please reach out to the Bias Acts Response Team.

Please continue to check your email, myOneonta, and the events calendar to learn about or participate in all that is happening. I am excited about all that you will accomplish this semester, and I look forward to seeing you at an event or around the quad soon!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Jan. 27 is the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi death camp in 1945, and has been designated International Holocaust Remembrance Day by the United Nations.

Each year, the United Nations Outreach Programme establishes a theme for Holocaust Remembrance Day. This year's theme is "Recognizing the Extraordinary Courage of Victims and Survivors of the Holocaust." Honoring those willing to stand up to and speak out against hatred and prejudice is something we need to do - not only for those who showed courage in the past, but also for those who show courage to combat intolerance, hate and injustices in today's society.

Additional information and a live stream of the UN Holocaust Memorial Ceremony is available on the United Nations website. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum also offers several online resources about how we can honor the victims and survivors. Please also watch for events hosted by the Office of Equity and Inclusion and other groups that support our core value of inclusivity.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President

During his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. stated, “I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.”

Dr. King's speeches and actions can serve as inspiration for us and how we engage in today's world. We can work together to spread love, speak truth, confront prejudice and champion diversity, equity and inclusion.

As today is a holiday when classes are not in session, the Office of Equity and Inclusion has planned a breakfast, keynote address and panel discussion in honor of Dr. King at the end of this month. This event is free and open to the public and will be held from 8 - 10 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 29, in the Center for Racial Justice and Inclusive Excellence in Lee Hall.

Dr. Jelani Cobb, author, educator and Dean of the Columbia Journalism School, will deliver the keynote address and host the panel discussion entitled "Reflections on the Legacy of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr." The panel will also feature members of the SUNY Oneonta and Hartwick College communities.

In the spirit of community, attendees are encouraged to bring donation items to contribute to the Red Dragon Food Pantry. Additionally, the Office of Equity and Inclusion will recognize the winners of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day essay writing contest, which was open to local elementary, middle and high school students.

All students, faculty and staff are invited and encouraged to attend the event on the 29th. Thank you to the Office of Equity and Inclusion, Capek Family Fund for Inclusive Excellence, the Activities Council, University Advancement, and Hartwick College for helping us to ensure Dr. King's legacy lives on. Enjoy the remainder of the winter break, and we look forward to seeing you next week for the Spring 2024 semester.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President

Dear Red Dragons,

As we reflect on 2023 and look to 2024, we wish for peace and joy to be present each day and in the year ahead. Sending love and light to you and yours.

Sincerely,
Alberto J.F. Cardelle & Rachel Frick Cardelle

Veterans Day presents a time for us to recognize and honor those who have served in our nation's armed forces. Their actions are examples of selfless dedication to others, for which we are grateful.

I want to give a special note of thanks to the members of the SUNY Oneonta community, employees, students, alumni, and friends who are current or retired military personnel. You enrich our university, and we are grateful for your valor. Many of us also have parents, grandparents, friends, and other relatives who have served, and we admire their courage and sacrifice.

Thank you to all who attended the Veterans Day celebrations hosted by the Office of Student Experience last week. Seeing our community come together to commend Red Dragons who served was powerful. We are proud of veterans for their service to our country and their belief in and strength to protect our democracy.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

During our day-to-day activities here at SUNY Oneonta, we spend time discussing and contemplating important and significant issues and concepts. We invest our time and resources into a myriad of programs and initiatives. Some of us turn to literature, philosophy, music, art, religion, or nature to help us find meaning or solace. We find ways to unite as a community to hold discussions, listen to one another, and provide support.

We also try to ponder on and accentuate the good that we see in our world. Nonetheless, we are not immune to feeling sorrow. It hurts when we don't have answers about losses or adversities we experience, whether they affect us personally, as a community, as a nation, or as a global society.

It is in times like these that I recall a saying that my grandmother often told me, “La esperanza es la cura para la decepción de hoy.” “Hope is the cure for today’s sorrow.”

For me, hope emerges from our community - from the compassion and kindness I see and experience. Hope manifests through the hard work and commitment demonstrated by all students, faculty, and staff daily here at SUNY Oneonta.

Throughout the semester, I have watched members of our campus community organize meetings, hold supportive assemblies, take on leadership positions, overcome obstacles and challenges, and send positive messages to those who may need a little extra love - all to show care and concern for others. I have seen Red Dragons put in work to better our community through volunteer and service efforts, perform marvelously on our athletic fields to represent our institution, dedicate long hours to music, dance and theatrical performances for others to enjoy, and serve as conscientious partners through contributions to their jobs and in classrooms, labs, studios and other learning spaces.

Examples like these and the collective work of the SUNY Oneonta community to support one another give me hope to help soothe my sorrow. I hope they help do the same for you.

We have upcoming opportunities to come together and promote healing and hope. The student-led candlelight vigil is on Nov. 13 at 7 p.m. at the Pillars, and the informal community gathering at the Hunt Union pond is on Nov. 15 at 1:30 p.m.

Over the next several weeks, we will share stories with insights to help everyone learn more about the great things happening across campus. Let's continue to look for and recognize the things that can give us hope. For me, at the top of that list is our Red Dragon community.

With gratitude,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

​​​​Today, we honor the world’s Indigenous People. We acknowledge the dissonance around the history of colonization and celebrate the historical and cultural heritage of indigenous, tribal and native peoples, both here in the United States and across the world. This is rooted in our core value of inclusivity and our dedication to social justice.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President

From Sept. 15 - Oct. 15, we celebrate Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month. This celebration is not just a recognition of a particular heritage but an affirmation of the values that are the foundation of our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. At SUNY Oneonta, we believe that diversity is an asset and a source of strength that energizes our collective growth and innovation.

Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month allows us to celebrate diversity and renew our commitment to creating an inclusive and equitable environment for all. In addition, this month-long celebration serves as an inspiration for future generations. It showcases representative role models who prove that one's heritage should never be a barrier to success. Finally, the month reminds us of common humanity. It reinforces that, beneath our different backgrounds and experiences, we are all part of a shared history.

In addition to the Parade of Nations and Fiesta held on Sept. 15 to kick off the month, there are many activities and events planned for us to engage, learn, and celebrate together.

• Keynote & Poetry Workshop featuring SUNY Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, Ricardo Nazario y Colón:
  Friday, Sept. 22, 12 p.m. in Craven Lounge, Morris Conference Center.
  
  Dr. Ricardo Nazario y Colón will deliver a keynote address and public reading of his poetry collection "The Moor of the Bronx" from 12 - 1:30 p.m. He will also host a poetry workshop from 2 - 3 p.m.
• Latinx Heritage Concert featuring Alex Torres and his Latin Orchestra:
  Friday, Sept. 22, 6 p.m. in the Quad
• Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Festival:
  Friday, Oct. 13, 3 p.m. in the Center for Racial Justice and Inclusive Excellence, Lee Hall
• A block party, paint & sip, and other Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month-themed events are being offered by various student clubs and organizations.

Thank you for being a part of our shared journey of celebrating diversity, fostering unity, and making SUNY Oneonta a better place to learn, work and live.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President

Success of the Grow. Thrive. Live. The Future of Oneonta Fundraising Campaign Will Benefit All

This summer, SUNY Oneonta's largest comprehensive fundraising campaign, Grow. Thrive. Live. The Future of SUNY Oneonta, came to a close. This is a historic occasion because the campaign is the university's most successful fundraising effort in our 134-year history.

With an original goal of raising $25 million in five years, more than $33.2 million was raised in gifts, grants, pledges, and estate planning commitments. More than 10,000 people donated to the SUNY Oneonta Foundation during the campaign, establishing 152 new scholarships and student program support funds.

The funds raised during this campaign will have far-reaching benefits all across our university. Admissions can assure prospective students about the availability of financial assistance far into the future. Enrolled students are provided with a source of emergency funding for unforeseen expenditures and opportunities to engage in internships, global education and student research. Faculty will benefit from professional development funding. Ultimately, the success of this campaign shows the passion generated by our alumni, staff, faculty, students and all other donors when asked to support our mission of “Nurturing a community where students grow intellectually, thrive socially and live purposefully” and the future of public higher education.

We know many of you donated, and we are grateful for the generosity of our university community. Every donation to Grow. Thrive. Live. is providing new and expanded funding for student scholarships, program support and more.

Grow. Thrive. Live. started with a silent launch in 2018 and then launched publicly in January 2020. The campaign’s original $25 million goal was surpassed 15 months ahead of schedule in early 2022. At that time, the SUNY Oneonta Foundation Board of Directors announced three new stretch goals for the remainder of the campaign:

1. Fully endow the SUNY Oneonta Student Emergency Fund with $1 million.
2. Establish at least 25 additional endowed scholarships or student support funds.
3. Increase the unrestricted portion of the SUNY Oneonta Foundation endowment.

Grow. Thrive. Live. was led by campaign co-chairs Linda ’76 and Pat ’75 McCann from Newtown, PA. Through their leadership and personal generosity, Linda and Pat fully embraced the opportunity to lead an effort that would permanently enhance access to an affordable and inclusive SUNY Oneonta education.

When the COVID-19 pandemic reached the United States only two months after the public launch, swift and thoughtful decision-making by the McCann’s—alongside the SUNY Oneonta Foundation Board of Directors—temporarily shifted the campaign’s fundraising focus to the university’s Student Emergency Fund. This shift in focus resonated with the entire SUNY Oneonta community and helped to ensure that $50,000 annually was, and will continue to be, provided to support students facing unforeseen emergencies.

Charitable gifts of all sizes powered the success of Grow. Thrive. Live., from the campaign’s largest commitment of more than $1 million to thousands of gifts of $100 or less. SUNY Oneonta alumni from eight decades supported the campaign, along with donors from all 50 states and seven countries. Through a collective effort, we have maximized support for our students and are addressing the university's greatest needs. Thank you to everyone!

For more information about the Grow. Thrive. Live. campaign and its impact on the university, please visit the campaign website.

With sincere appreciation,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President
Paul J. Adamo, Vice President for University Advancement and Executive Director of the SUNY Oneonta Foundation

Good afternoon, my name is Alberto Jose Cardelle and I have the honor to serve as President of this notable institution, and it is my pleasure to welcome you to SUNY Oneonta’s Academic Convocation for the 138th graduating class. By the way, that means you class of 2027!

I know some of you are transferring here and joining us with some college experience already, but this message is equally as important for you, no matter when you will graduate 2027, 2026 or 2025.

Before I continue, I would like to introduce the members of the stage party who will not be introduced later in the program. Please stand when I call your name.
Mr. Paul Adamo – Vice President for University Advancement and Executive Director, of the SUNY Oneonta Foundation
Ms. Julie Piscitello – Vice President of Finance and Administration
Dr. Bernadette Tiapo –Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer
Dr. Tracy Allen – Dean of the School of Sciences
Dr. Mark Davies – Dean of the School of Education, Human Ecology and Sports Studies
Dr. Keith Jones – Associate Professor of Mathematics, Presiding Officer of the Faculty and Chair of the College Senate

Students, today you join a community where hundreds of thousands of students have come before you. Like you will do during your time on campus, they experienced both success and difficulties. What will always help you overcome the challenges and celebrate the successes is remembering why you are here.

Your peers and fellow Red Dragons that have taken this journey for the previous 134 years were here in times of war, in times of disease, in times of economic hardship, and in times of civil unrest. They may have been part of fraternities and sororities, part of an athletic team, part of student government, part of clubs and honor societies, and yes others may have come just for the social scene. But if you peel all of that back, they all came to SUNY Oneonta for the same thing - an education and to be part of an academic community.

And by education I do not mean the memorization of facts. By education I don’t mean being able to spit back up in an essay exactly what you heard in class. And, by education I don’t merely mean a diploma.

After all, (takes out phone) you can google most if not all of the world’s facts or those that you will discuss in class. You can ask chatGPT to write you a mediocre passionless essay on almost any topic, and for the right price I am sure you may even be able to get yourself a diploma.

By education I mean the development of your higher-order cognitive skills; your understanding and appreciation of aesthetic, cultural, historical and intellectual concerns; your ability to better handle the problematic issues facing our society; and your ability to develop and appreciate interpersonal relationships - including a respect for differences among people, ideas and values.

And you will not get any of that from this little machine (points to phone). You will get it from the talented, dedicated faculty and staff who have joined us here today and who you will get to know over the next few years.

Now if you are thinking, “Crap. I'm not sure I can do this,” I’ll put it frankly - that is B.S. You are here because we know that you can be successful in each and every one of your semesters. You’ve got the right stuff, but we are also here to help you be successful.

Many decades ago, when I sat where you are the person talking said "Look to your right and your left. Only one of you will make it through college." Yikes, right? Well, that mindset is dead here at SUNY Oneonta, we know you can be, and we want all of you to be successful.

So please take out your phones, yes take them out, and take a selfie with everyone around you, do as wide an angle as you can, I will do the same up here.

Keep this picture. I want it to be a reminder that not only will one of you or two of you will be successful, but all of you in this picture can be successful. Everyone will experience successes in their own way. We are here to help you and you are here to help each other over the next few years as you approach commencement.

Regarding commencement – it may seem as if it is a long time away, but in my 30 years in education I have not heard any student on graduation day say, “Boy that took forever.” Instead, they are shocked at how fast it went by, and then years later they realize how important their time at college was.

Thank you and I am thrilled you chose to join us here at SUNY Oneonta. I can’t wait to see all that you accomplish.

Welcome back, Red Dragons!

I hope you had an energizing summer, and I am excited to welcome you to the 2023 - 2024 academic year at SUNY Oneonta. I know the weekend will be busy as you all finish preparing for classes and setting up your living spaces. If I haven't been able to say hello in person yet, I look forward to seeing you at the free Opening Picnic lunch outside of Milne Library on Monday, Aug. 28.

The SUNY Oneonta community provides many opportunities to explore your different interests. To make the most of your experience, remember to browse the 100+ clubs and organizations, go to athletic games and competitions, attend theatre performances and check out all the events open to students. Later in the semester, we will welcome Clint Smith, author of our 2023 Common Read "How the Word is Passed," for the Mills Distinguished Lecture on Oct. 23. Free copies of the book will be available for you to pick up during Red Day, Friday, Sept. 1, on the quad.

I know the recent decisions by the Supreme Court regarding Affirmative Action, student loan debt and other important issues may raise some questions about what life at colleges and universities in the U.S. will look like in the future. I want to assure you that, now more than ever, SUNY Oneonta remains dedicated to providing affordable, equitable access to our transformative educational opportunities. With inclusivity as one of our three core values, we know that diversity is among the many critical factors in sustaining a community that produces the well-rounded, accomplished scholars that our region, state and nation need. As a public regional university, we will continue cultivating relationships and pathways to ensure promising students from all backgrounds are able to join and enrich our community.

Our commitments to you as our students will be front and center this year as the university community will be working together to develop our next strategic plan. This plan will provide goals and desired outcomes to guide the university's actions over the next 10 years. We will also work to ensure our strategies for supporting students, faculty, staff, the university community and the local region remain up to date and able to adjust to changes we may see in higher education.

I want each of you to know that I believe you belong here at SUNY Oneonta. It doesn't matter if you are just beginning your journey or returning, I know that you will have a transformational experience here as long as you take advantage of the opportunities to learn and get involved. I am thrilled for classes to begin and hope to see all of you around campus soon.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

The first week of classes is upon us, and I am thrilled to welcome you all to the 2023 - 2024 academic year. I hope you found time over the summer to enjoy activities that relax or reenergize you and spend time with people you care about. I also hope you are excited for classes, programs and events to begin again here at the university. One of the things I am most proud of at SUNY Oneonta is the willingness I see from faculty, staff and students to connect with others, work together and participate in activities as a community.

In fact, the sense of community at SUNY Oneonta was something many students and families pointed out to me during Commencement last spring and Orientation this summer. Excellent teamwork was on full display during the Day One Orientation program over the summer and now during move-in. This was especially the case with the rapid move into Alumni Hall, which included planning, preparation, coordination and work by Facilities Planning, Maintenance and Operations, the Lockshop, Custodial, the Bull Gang and ITS Networking, Telecommunications and Customer Support. These are just a few examples of the excellent efforts to collaborate and create an atmosphere of openness, comfort, and friendliness. It doesn't go unnoticed and is very much appreciated.

We will begin this year having hit many important milestones in improving enrollment and retention for our university community. We are bringing in nearly 1,800 new students (first-year, transfer and graduate). This includes 120 EOP students, our largest class of new EOP students ever. First- to second-year retention won't be finalized until October but is projected to be 79.8%, a significant improvement from the past two years and above the national average of 67% for public institutions. We improved persistence among students in need of extra support through the work of those involved in the Academic Success Program. It is clear the students are excited to be here. You can read the opening message I shared with them online. Each and every one of us plays an essential role in providing the outstanding academic and co-curricular experience we are known for, and I thank you for your efforts.

I ask that we continue fostering our strong sense of community and support one another as we build on these successes and work collectively on developing our next strategic plan throughout this year. Collaboration and creativity will be key as we plan for the future and to ensure we remain an excellent choice for generations of students to come. In that regard, there will be many occasions for us to work, learn and socialize together, like during the campus dialogues, teach-ins, mingles, campus picnic, employee breakfast, Alumni Hall ribbon cutting, Mills Distinguished Lecture, and programs offered by departments, offices and clubs. I look forward to seeing you all at some or all of these events.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

​​​​​​Middle States Commission Reaffirms SUNY Oneonta’s Accreditation

Dear Colleagues,

Last week the Middle States reaccreditation process begun nearly three years ago came to a happy end: The Middle States Commission of Higher Education (MSCHE) reaffirmed SUNY Oneonta’s institutional accreditation “with no follow-up reporting” required.

Perhaps best of all, the process achieved MSCHE’s goal for campuses undertaking reaccreditation: It engendered campus-wide review of—and conversation about—our collective achievement and pointed to areas most in need of improvement. The thorough Site Team evaluation performed in April, in fact, drew many of the same conclusions our Self Study did: We have achievement gaps among student subpopulations that have widened in the past five years that we need to direct resources and attention toward. (We are well-positioned to make progress in closing these equity gaps, aided by an Equity Gap Analysis recently completed by our Office of Institutional Research.) Improvements are also needed in our planning and assessment efforts to ensure that our planning is integrated and cascaded throughout the institution and our assessments are sufficiently outcomes-based so that the results are easily shared and usable.

For those interested in reading the specific suggestions and recommendations made by the Site Team Evaluators and/or our Institutional Response to the team’s findings, please consult our Middle States webpage.

Reaccreditation could not have happened without the effort of many faculty members, staff, administrators, and students working together, diligently and thoughtfully, to evaluate the institution’s progress in the past ten years. Thanks again to all of those who contributed to this vital service to our institution. As we prepare to respond to the findings of this reaccreditation effort, please remember it is never too early to think about the role you might play in six years as we begin to organize our next team to shoulder the next round of reaccreditation work!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President
Eileen Morgan-Zayachek, Senior Associate Provost, AVP for Academic Affairs & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Theresa Russo, Special Assistant to the Provost & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Andrew Kahl, Professor, Theatre Department & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair

At SUNY Oneonta, we work to sustain a welcoming community for everyone throughout the year. During Pride Month, we make a special call for all Red Dragons to reinforce and emphasize our commitment to advocacy, respect and support while also combating bigotry and hate in our world.

SUNY is also celebrating Pride with the theme of "A Place for Pride" this year. SUNY's statement on Pride speaks to our university's values of inclusivity and service. SUNY Oneonta's own Emily Stewart is featured on the SUNY Pride Through the Years timeline and discusses the history of our Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, the first of its kind in SUNY. SUNY will be participating in PrideFest in New York City on Sunday, June 25. Members of the SUNY community are encouraged to join and can register online. The Otsego Pride Alliance also has a list of local events happening in our region.

Together we can ensure SUNY Oneonta remains a distinguished example of a place where everyone feels comfortable and safe to be their most authentic selves.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto Cardelle, President

Dear SUNY Oneonta Community,

Let's use this Juneteenth to reflect on how we can work together to end the inequities facing our society today. As we honor and celebrate the significance of this holiday, let's ask ourselves how we can each do our part to ensure our country learns from the past and strives to make our future more just and supportive for all.

The 2023 Juneteenth celebration in Oneonta will be held on Saturday, June 17, in Neahwa Park. It will highlight Black-owned or Black-run businesses local to our community and promises to be a wonderful event!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

We've reached the end of the 2022-2023 academic year, and I thank you for all you did to make it a success. With finals wrapping up and Commencement on Saturday, there is much to applaud.

This year, we completed a lengthy and demanding reaccreditation self-study and had a successful visit with a team from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. We attained university status. Generous donors gave more than $1 million in gifts, grants and pledges to endow our Student Emergency Fund, and we are on track to finalize the most successful fundraising campaign in our history. We commemorated the 30th anniversary of The Black List and celebrated ways the institution has been, and will continue, making changes and strides forward. Chancellor King visited campus and learned about the great things happening at Oneonta and what students are looking for. The Regional Innovation Council formally launched, and we have established partnerships with local school districts and businesses. We've made significant progress toward the opportunities identified in Regaining Momentum: An Agenda for SUNY Oneonta. We became the new host to SUNY COIL and New York State History Day. The institution was recognized for our achievements and commitments, like being invited to join the Aspen Institute's American Talent Initiative and being awarded a silver sustainability rating by the Association for Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. Our students participated, won or placed in competitions in several states and countries and were even featured on national television. These are just a fraction of the many events and projects accomplished by the talented members of the SUNY Oneonta community. I strongly encourage you to take a moment to and scroll back through all of the stories featured on our News & Events page and in Notes from Netzer throughout the past year. I hope they give you the same sense of admiration and pride that they do for me.

As always, the growing pressures on higher education mean we need to continue working to strengthen SUNY Oneonta.

The outlook for Fall 2023 enrollment remains positive. Our Admissions team reviewed almost 15,000 applications. We are up by more than 25% in deposits for first-year students and more than 50% for transfer students. We anticipate approximately 1,525 new undergraduate students will be joining us in August. Deposits for graduate students are also up nearly 50% for Summer 2023 and 40% for Fall 2023, year over year.

While there is much to make us feel confident, we have developed a new student enrollment plan to strengthen and shape undergraduate enrollment and expand graduate enrollment. You can view our 2023-2025 New Student Enrollment Plan online, which outlines the scope of the plan, data, demographic trends and considerations, competition and goals.

We are also focusing on improving our first to second-year retention rate and analyzing equity gaps among various groups within our student body. To help with this, we will be establishing the University Retention Council. This is a result of the excellent work done by members of the Retention Persistence Completion Committee, Enrollment Management Team and Student Success Leadership Group, which led us to form this new council.

As I've mentioned in several recent meetings, we will begin developing a new strategic plan in the fall. Regaining Momentum will lead us through December 2023, but a more comprehensive strategic plan is necessary. The emerging challenges within higher education and the Middle States team's response to their site visit will guide us during this process. To develop a new strategic plan, we will take an integrated planning approach conducted by the University Budget Committee and the new University Strategic Planning Committee. Together, these groups form the University Integrated Planning Council. Details on the University Integrated Planning Council and the conceptual planning model for our next strategic plan are outlined online.

There is much to look forward to for the 2023-2024 academic year. Again, thank you for your hard work. Congratulations on all you achieved and that which we accomplished collectively this year. I also thank you in advance for participating in institution-wide, divisional, departmental and individual initiatives that will continue supporting our commitment to nurturing a community where students grow intellectually, thrive socially and live purposefully.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Eight Faculty & Staff Recognized by SUNY for Excellence

I am proud to announce that the SUNY Board of Trustees and the Chancellor have recognized seven members of our faculty and staff with Chancellor's Awards for Excellence and one faculty member with a Distinguished Rank this year.

Dr. George Hovis, Professor of English, has been conferred with a Distinguished Teaching Professorship. This is SUNY's highest academic rank and recognizes outstanding teaching competence and mastery consistently demonstrated over many years at SUNY Oneonta. Dr. Hovis has been a member of the faculty in our English department since 2006, has served on numerous committees, advised student organizations and been a sponsor for the Student Grant Program for Research and Creative Activity for several years. In 2017 he was awarded the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching. Read more about Dr. Hovis and his accomplishments.

Phil Bidwell, Lynda Craft, Mark English, Dr. Maria Cristina Montoya, Dr. Marius Munteanu, Dr. Mine Ozer and Sarah Rhodes have been named among the 2023 SUNY Chancellor's Awards for Excellence honorees.

Please join me in congratulating these leaders. Learn more about them and their accomplishments.

George, Phil, Lynda, Mark, Maria Cristina, Marius, Mine and Sarah are most deserving of this distinction. They will be recognized during commencement exercises on Saturday, May 20. These recognitions acknowledge their superior achievement in their disciplines and service to the institution, and I am honored to have them as a part of our university community.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

2023 SUNY Chancellor's Award for Student Excellence Winners & Honorary Degree Recipient

Three members of the senior class have been named 2023 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence recipients: Jamie Crique, Melissa Rose Garrecht, and Robert Lang.

These exceptional student-leaders and scholars with outstanding achievements have served as role models for their peers here at SUNY Oneonta. As three of only 193 students from across the SUNY system who received the award this year, they were honored at a ceremony in Albany yesterday. Read more about Jamie, Melissa Rose, and Robert and their accomplishments.

I am also pleased to announce that we will award an Honorary Doctor of Science Degree to Dr. Mitchell Olman during commencement next month. Dr. Olman graduated from SUNY Oneonta in 1978 with a bachelor's degree in Chemistry. He went on to earn a master's degree in Anatomy from Columbia University and an M.D. from the New York University School of Medicine.

After beginning his career in internal medicine at the University of Chicago Hospitals and Clinics, he became a research fellow in their Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care. He then held a pulmonary medicine subspecialty fellowship at the University of California at San Diego and became a visiting investigator at the prestigious nonprofit biomedical research organization, the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. From 1993 - 2009, Dr. Olman worked at the University of Alabama at Birmingham as a member of the faculty and senior scientist in several research centers and attained the rank of Full Professor of Pathology and Medicine. In 2009, he joined the renowned Cleveland Clinic as a physician-scientist. Today, he leads a pulmonology laboratory in the Department of Inflammation and Immunity at the Cleveland Clinic's Lerner Research Institute. Dr. Olman's and The Mitchell Olman Laboratory's work focuses mainly on pathogenesis and treatment for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension. Among his many other accomplishments, Dr. Olman has served as a primary or co-investigator on grants supported by the National Institutes of Health, has co-authored publications in several prominent scientific journals, and is a member of the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation Peer Review Committee.

Dr. Olman remains very connected to the university. He returned to campus to give the Student Research and Creative Activity Day keynote address in 2011 and was recognized as an Alumni of Distinction by the SUNY Oneonta Alumni Association in 2014. He also established the Dr. Mitchell Olman and Dr. Candace Gladson Scholarship in honor of Professor Bruce Knauer for students who major in Chemistry and have financial need.

Dr. Olman will receive his honorary degree and give the commencement address at the commencement ceremonies on Saturday, May 20. We will also recognize Jamie, Melissa Rose and Robert during the ceremonies. Please join me in congratulating all four Red Dragons on these well-deserved honors.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

The site visit from the Middle States team has concluded, and we would like to extend a university-wide thank you to all who prepared for and participated in this effort. The reaccreditation process, though long and demanding, is essential for our continued success in supporting students and helping SUNY Oneonta remain a great place to learn, live and work.

As noted in the site visit team's report this morning, there are many things to celebrate at SUNY Oneonta. We look forward to the Commission's official accreditation decision this summer.

Contributions to the reaccreditation efforts came from all corners of campus: from people who shared their facilities; provided IT and web support; worked on the weekends to facilitate the visit; provided transportation; served meals; served on the working groups; read and revised self-study drafts; provided evidence; rallied students and colleagues; attended meetings; or provided moral support. This process was truly a community effort.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President
Eileen Morgan-Zayachek, Senior Associate Provost, AVP for Academic Affairs & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Theresa Russo, Assistant VP for Academic Affairs & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Andrew Kahl, Professor, Theatre Department & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair

Dear Red Dragons,

Welcome to the Spring 2023 semester! I hope that you are looking forward to classes beginning on Wednesday and were able to enjoy restful and relaxing moments over the past several weeks. There is much to look forward to this spring.

SUNY Oneonta's designation as a university instead of a college officially begins today! I hope you will attend the celebration of this momentous occasion this Wednesday, Jan. 25, at 3 p.m. in the International Lounge of the Hunt Union.

More than 190 new students are joining the Red Dragon family this semester. Welcome! Additionally, students looking to enroll for Fall 2023 will be on campus throughout the spring for visits. I am sure they will be impressed by the enthusiasm and accomplishments of our welcoming and talented community. Please watch for information from the Office of Admissions regarding admitted student events and opportunities where the university community may be able to assist.

SUNY's new chancellor, John B. King, Jr., began at the beginning of this month. He has embarked on a tour to visit all 64 SUNY campuses this spring. We do not yet have information on when he plans to visit Oneonta, but the details will be shared when they become available.

When sharing the many great things happening at SUNY Oneonta with alumni and friends of the university, I am met with enthusiasm and excitement. I am always inspired by the work you are doing in the classroom, in meetings, in offices, in artistic venues, on athletic fields, in groups and in our local community. I encourage you to stay informed and capitalize on opportunities to get involved and strengthen our community. Please continue to take good care of yourselves and your fellow Red Dragons. I look forward to continuing to support your work and activities and seeing all that is achieved.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

Welcome to the Spring 2023 semester! I hope you are looking forward to classes beginning on Wednesday and were able to enjoy restful and relaxing moments over the past several weeks. There is much to look forward to this spring.

SUNY Oneonta's designation as a university instead of a college officially begins today! I hope you will attend the celebration of this momentous occasion this Wednesday, Jan. 25, at 3 p.m. in the International Lounge of the Hunt Union.

More than 190 new students are joining the Red Dragon family this semester. Additionally, students looking to enroll for Fall 2023 will be on campus throughout the spring for visits. I am sure they will be impressed by the enthusiasm and accomplishments of our welcoming and talented community. Please watch for information from the Office of Admissions regarding admitted student events and opportunities where the university community may be able to assist.

SUNY's new chancellor, John B. King, Jr., began at the beginning of this month. He has embarked on a tour to visit all 64 SUNY campuses this spring. We do not yet have information on when he plans to visit Oneonta, but the details will be shared when they become available.

We are in the final stages of our re-accreditation with the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, a process of self-study and peer review to examine our institution, help us demonstrate accomplishments, highlight areas of excellence and identify opportunities to better serve students. An advanced draft of the self-study will be posted tomorrow on the university's self-study webpage. We have three weeks until we submit this self-study to the evaluation team that will conduct a site visit in April. The result of their three days on campus will be a report on their perception of our institution's progress and work toward meeting the seven standards set forth by Middle States. Details about the site visit will be shared as the date approaches. Please share any questions or feedback about the self-study by emailing msche@oneonta.edu.

Lastly, I look forward to seeing the creative and productive ways the university community makes use of the new common meeting time (3 - 4 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays). Continue to monitor the Oneonta Bulletin and CampusConnection for information about events, both during the common meeting time and otherwise. The common meeting time is just one example of the progress being made toward the opportunities listed within the Regaining Momentum agenda. Many additional efforts are underway in departments, schools, divisions, clubs and committees across campus. A more complete update on initiatives related to the agenda, funded projects and more will be shared later this semester.

When sharing the many great things happening at SUNY Oneonta with alumni and friends of the university, I am met with enthusiasm and excitement. I am always inspired by the work you are doing in the classroom, in meetings, in offices, in artistic venues, on athletic fields, in groups, in our local community and all across the region. I encourage you to stay informed and capitalize on opportunities to get involved and strengthen our community. Please continue to take good care of yourselves and one another. I look forward to continuing to support your work and activities and seeing all that is achieved.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

During this season, we hope you are able to reflect on all that you have

accomplished throughout the year and enjoy time with those you love.

Happy New Year from SUNY Oneonta!

Following the approval of Interim SUNY Chancellor Deborah Stanley and the SUNY Board of Trustees, SUNY Oneonta will be designated as a university instead of a college beginning Jan. 23, 2023!

In Jan. 2022, the New York State Board of Regents changed its regulations related to the number of graduate-level degrees an institution must offer to qualify as a university. Because we offer a range of registered undergraduate and graduate programs in the liberal arts and sciences, including at least three master's degrees in the disciplines of agriculture, biological sciences, business, education, engineering, fine arts, health professions, humanities, physical sciences or social sciences, we now can be classified as a university.

You may be wondering, "What does this mean and what is changing?" In short, only our name will change. Instead of "State University of New York College at Oneonta", our official name on record will be "State University of New York at Oneonta." Our moniker and branding will still be "SUNY Oneonta," and the type logo used on the web, publications and signage will not change.

This is a significant moment in our history. Designation as a university will strengthen the future of our institution and boost prospects for enrollment, especially among international and graduate students. It showcases our commitment to progress and more accurately reflects the structure and rigor of our distinguished academic offerings. While our mission and commitment to academic excellence and a student-centered teaching and learning environment remain unchanged, this designation sets us up for exciting opportunities like further development of online graduate degrees and creation of new partnerships and continuing education programs to serve our local community and regional workforce.

All students and employees are invited to gather for a reception to commemorate this new designation on the first day of Spring 2023 classes. Please mark your calendar for cake and refreshments on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2023, at 3 p.m. in the International Lounge in Hunt Union. I look forward to seeing you there and celebrating this new chapter for SUNY Oneonta.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear SUNY Oneonta Community,

Veterans Day presents a time for us to recognize the sacrifices of those who have served our country in the armed forces. Let's reflect on the dedication and selflessness of all who have served, and express special gratitude for the members of our college community, employees, students, alumni and friends who are current or retired military personnel. Their leadership and experiences enrich our college and their dedication to our country is honorable. In addition, we recognize many members of the extended Red Dragon family like parents, grandparents, friends and other relatives who have served. We should be forever grateful for their selfless sacrifice and courage.

I encourage you to participate in the events planned to honor our veterans tomorrow, Nov. 11. You can stop by the Hunt College Union from 11 a.m. - 1 p.m. to fill out a thank you card to be sent to veterans. At 3 p.m., all veterans in our college community and those who wish to thank them are invited to attend a reception at the Craven Lounge in the Morris Conference Center. It is also worth noting that the City of Oneonta is a Green Light for Military Service City and is encouraging community members to display a green light in windows to honor our current service members and veterans through Nov. 13.

We are proud of veterans for their service to our country and their belief in and willingness to protect our democracy.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Presented Oct. 14, 2022, to an assembly of college and university delegates, elected officials, students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members

Good Afternoon!
¡Buenas Tardes!

I would like to recognize our distinguished guests today: Chancellor Deborah Stanley, Trustee Eunice Lewin, Senator Peter Oberacker, Assemblyman Brian Miller, Mayor Mark Drnek, chairperson Patrick Brown, delegates, alumni, students, fellow administrators, faculty, staff, honored guests, my wife Dr. Rachel Frick Cardelle, and friends. All of you here are sharing a very special gift, that is the gift of your time, your presence, and your support. So, I am at a loss for words to express my gratitude to each of you here today. I can only think to say, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

It is more than a privilege to stand before all of you and share in this moment of history for SUNY Oneonta. Since the day I arrived 13 months ago, I have been honored to be part of this remarkable community.

I have been on a college or university campus as a student, researcher, faculty, Chair, Dean, Provost and now President for more than 30 years.

The last 23 years, I have been exclusively at regional public comprehensive universities. These years are filled, for the most part, with stories and memories about instances of success, some of failure but most importantly, those of the remarkable collective work I’ve experienced and accomplished with colleagues and students alike.

But along with those very energizing recollections, there are also memories of the times that that I fell short of espousing the mission of the great institutions at which I worked and the mission of public higher education, namely equitable access.

There was:

• The graduate student that I considered leaving off a grant because they had not completed an analysis on time;
• The meeting I cancelled with a student mentee because he had not shown up for two previous meetings;
• The student that I assigned to a lower quality internship because we did not believe they could perform and would embarrass the program; and
• The community-based organization I did not agree to work with because of rumors of poor financial management.

In each of these times I did exactly the opposite of what Gregory Boyle, a missionary working with gang members in the inner city of L.A., says are a sign of healthy community.

Instead of standing in awe of those in unfortunate circumstances and what they must carry, I judged them and how they carried it.

• In the first case I did not stand in awe of how the graduate student was both managing their schoolwork and trying to decide what to do about an unexpected pregnancy;
• With my mentee, I did not ask about their family life, because if had I, I would have learned that they are an orphan and the family they were living with was moving out of state and he was not sure what he was going to do;
• With the third student, I should have been in awe of his resiliency in reaching the point of completing an internship despite his learning disabilities caused by fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, and;
• Finally, I should have been in admiration of what that small community-based organization was doing to help the population of indigenous people in a predominantly white community which did not understand its customs.

At the core of my actions there was a lack of caring, but the actual root of the problem was a lack of curiosity, awareness and attentiveness. I had fallen into my academic silo and, unlike prairie dogs that at least peak out of their burrows every so often, made decisions in the darkness and confines of that silo. I was not aware of the challenges faced by the communities from which our students come from or where our institutions are housed.

Yes, these were individual shortcomings, but they happened within a system whose reward systems are not always in line with the missions that they profess.

As faculty and staff at a college or university, we are rewarded and celebrated for personal accomplishments, our teaching, our advising, our student services, where we get published, how are recognized by professional organizations, etc. etc.

We have created a system in which it is easier to get noticed through insular and parochial pathways, and disciplinary and professional purity than because of collective action.

In this chronic hardening of the silos, we easily lack the attention required for, and the curiosity about, the broad comprehensive actions and perspectives that are more likely to positively impact the communities where we are located, and therefore improving the structures that influence our students.

This institution has the history, the assets and most importantly, has adopted a mission to overcome these problems. We must find ways to make our stated mission which reads, “We nurture a community where students grow intellectually, thrive socially and live purposefully,” a reality.

A mission that is relevant to all.

We want an institution that will be as relevant 150 years from now as it was 133 years ago when it was founded.

However, institutions cannot simply will their relevance into existence. To be relevant, institutions must engage with the challenges. To be relevant, we must propose solutions. In short, institutions must get dirty in the messy world and jump into the trenches of our social, economic, scientific, and moral debates. We must be critical collaborators in improving the human condition.

As former SUNY chancellor Ernest Boyer argued, “We need to shape our institution from the outside in and surpass the boundaries between the academy and the world.”

For this goal of becoming relevant to happen there are three intertwined areas of work.

• First, our campuses must be a vehicle of social and economic mobility for all students.
  • We must not only open our doors to all students, we must give them a relentless welcome so that they feel supported and secure and can attain their aspirations right here at SUNY Oneonta. We must provide our students with the opportunity to establish a rich web of relationships through instruction, advisement and mentorship so that they learn, grow and thrive from not only books and lectures, but through conversations and discussions, with not only instructors and advisors but with people who can be life-long mentors.
  • However, we must also ensure that these students are reflective of the communities we are supposed to serve, our student body must resemble the diversity of the state. So too, is it necessary for our faculty and staff members to be diverse. Students must be able to see themselves among those they work with and learn from.
  • To state it simply, our institutions must be beacons of representation.
• Second, we need to respond to the needs of our communities and region by offering the relevant research and creative endeavors that our communities demand. We must champion publicly-engaged scholarship. Higher education’s goal of advancing knowledge nationally or globally cannot leapfrog our local needs. If we are not advancing knowledge for the benefit of the communities in which we reside, who will?
• Third, we need to be premier stewards of place. We must cultivate more than sustained partnerships with our communities, our relationships must be in a “symbiotic collusion” - that in which the host region’s future and the future of the institution are inextricably linked. SUNY Oneonta should strive not only to be in Oneonta but to be of Oneonta. We must not only be in Otsego County we must be of Otsego County.

Interestingly, this vision is really nothing new - it is a case of going back to the future, let me explain.

In 1887 as SUNY Oneonta was being established as the Oneonta Normal School, the local newspaper wrote,

“The establishment of this school in Oneonta is an event of supreme importance in the history of this community and of this locality. It means advantages not to be estimated, not merely to those who now are, but to those who should follow; not merely to those who will be within the circle of its immediate influence, but to those unnumbered who are destined indirectly to feel its impulse.”

This 135-year-old expression of hope and prediction for the impact of this institution is our continued purpose — to be relevant to those here and beyond.

We have an opportunity to understand, heal, and strengthen our communities. You here as educators, students, and citizens, and you all have the opportunity to pull away from our sometimes deficit-minded present and be part of an optimistic future.

I ask us to reflect on the generations that came before us in times of in times of war, in times of disease, in times of economic hardship and in times of civil unrest, and realize that there is strong evidence that this optimistic future is not a Sisyphean task, but an attainable aspiration that this institution has been conquering for more than a century.

And if you are asking yourself, "What is it that I can do?"

I want to leave you with a quote from one of my favorite Latinx authors, Sandra Cisneros.

“Cuanto mayor me hago, más consciente soy de las formas en que cosas muy pequeñas pueden hacer un cambio en el mundo. Pequeñas cosas, pero el mundo está hecho de pequeñas cosas, ¿no es así?"
“The older I get the more I am conscious of ways very small things can make a change in the world. Tiny little things, but the world is made of tiny matters, is it not?”

As a real manifestation of this belief, before concluding I would like to announce that, as a result of the commitment of over 9,000 donors who have contributed to our Grow.Thrive.Live The Future of Oneonta fundraising campaign, we have now endowed our Student Emergency Fund with more than one million dollars so that we can assist students experiencing an emergency who require assistance to offset temporary financial difficulty and be relevant in their lives.

Thank you very much.

View Inauguration Ceremony Recording

Welcome back. hope you had a great summer. I am thrilled we are able to be back together and hosting this breakfast again. We are starting this year in a stronger position because of the excellent work over the last year and this summer.

We are only five days into the academic year and already we’ve had:

• An army of volunteers making the experience of moving in for every student special and fun.
• 1400 students come together with faculty and staff to celebrate the beginning of their academic journey here at SUNY Oneonta.
• Students with their laptops studying in nooks across campus. This is because of IT’s hard work upgrading WiFi access.
• Students who are recounting the amazing experience they had in a camping trip one week before classes started through the GEOFYRST program.
• New students who’ve already made good friends because of the summer AEOP program.
• Employees saying hello to returning students as if they were family.
• Academic Advisement, the Registrar’s Office and Financial Aid were out under the tent helping students in a friendly environment.
• A more hospitable temperature in IRC because of the work of facilities
• Faculty meeting outside talking about general education curricula.

These are just a few examples of what has happened over the past few days.

I understand that many times it is easy to find yourself working on projects by yourself or with a small group of your peers and wondering if it makes a difference. Believe me it does.

Last week, I walked by Student Accounts and overhead staff working with a family and explaining their aid package and what to expect. They were patient as the family expressed some confusion about the process. Later on, I heard the same family downstairs in Netzer commenting on how much better they felt after speaking to the staff person.

The truth is that many of you may never encounter all of the students that you help because you are not there when they come into a clean classroom, are working WiFi, are processing something in their file behind the scenes, etc. Or, you may see them only once as you help them with a question or pass them in the hallway. What you don’t see is how that encounter played an impact on whether they could stay in school, or whether they felt at home and decided to stick it out after a tough day.

Last year I used the analogy of a puzzle - that we were all like puzzle pieces that, when put together, make up the full picture of this institution. I think a better analogy is one with bricks. We are all individual bricks that, if not part of bigger enterprise, are just pieces sitting in a pile. But, put together, we provide a base - a steppingstone for a whole generation of students to have the opportunity to dream and accomplish things they would not otherwise.

I told the students at convocation that they were following the path that students who have come to this institution for the last 133 years. Those students had been here in times of war, in times of disease, in times of economic hardship, and in times of civil unrest. The same is true for all of them.

We are building on what four to five generations of professionals have done. You are not just processing a file or a check, you are making sure that this institution remains vibrant and effective for another 133 years and for another four to five generations of students. You are playing a critical role in creating opportunities our students may not have otherwise.

And, most Importantly, providing our students with a relentless welcome. So, I ask that we use this vision as we continue with our work this year.

We will soon be announcing the next round of funding for projects related to the strategic opportunities and Regaining Momentum Agenda. We have already had one dialogue session this year, and it is my goal to have one per month. Keep an eye on the bulletin for announcements about each, and please join to be a part of the conversation. We have also submitted the letter to the SUNY Board of Trustees requesting designation as a university and should hear back soon.

There are many events and activities planned for this year and I encourage you to take advantage of all that is happening. It invigorating to attend so many social events and activities. There will be several events surrounding the commemoration of the 30th anniversary of the Black List, the Common Read and Mills Distinguished Lecture with George Takei, other well-known speakers and many community building events.

And by the way, because of your hard work we have been ranked in the top 200 by money magazine and top 500 in the country (out of 4000) by Forbes.

Lastly, we haven't had a breakfast since 2019, and it has been traditional to recognize employees who are new or in new roles, so I would like to ask everyone who has joined the college since August 2019 to stand, and anyone who is in a new position or received a promotion since Aug. 2019 to stand and be recognized.

The work that each and every one of you do makes a difference in the life of our institution and therefore the lives of our students and your co-workers. Thank you for your effort and dedication. And I also want to let you know how very happy I am that I am here, and I am proud to be working alongside all of you to continue to make SUNY Oneonta a place founded in honor and good faith.

Thank you.

Dear students,

It gives me a wonderful feeling that I have the privilege of welcoming students to another academic year at SUNY Oneonta. I am very excited for this year, my first full academic year as a Red Dragon.

The college is ready for move-in and for classes to begin. It is going to be an active and invigorating year, as evidenced by the number of events and activities happening during the first few weeks of classes. Later this semester, we will have events where all members of the college community can engage in activities and discussions regarding our Common Read book, "They Called Us Enemy" by George Takei. Please mark your calendars to hear this renowned actor, author and activist talk about his life and the book as he delivers the Mills Distinguished Lecture on Oct. 24. We will also welcome award-winning journalist, Nikole Hannah-Jones on Nov. 3, when she will speak about the 1619 project in commemoration of the occurrence of the Black List. Additional information about these events will be shared as the dates get closer.

As everyone returns to school and our routines, I want to remind you of the special opportunity you have as part of an academic community. This means being part of a community that engages in discussions about many different topics and issues and, most importantly, engages with the world around us. This summer has certainly provided issues with which to engage. Recent Supreme Court decisions have altered the role of government and impacted our college, region, nation, and world. The dramatic shift in the governance of abortion rights through the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision and the overturning of Roe v. Wade is momentous and calls for institutions of higher education like ours to do what we do best – inform, debate and engage. It is important to remember that here in New York, our laws distinctly outline that residents of our state have the right to comprehensive reproductive healthcare, which includes the right to make choices about their healthcare and future. However, we cannot discount the greater impact this decision will have on public health and our society. Other decisions further strengthen this call to become involved in national deliberations. The Court's decisions on concealed weapons, overturning a century-old New York law, and the Environmental Protection Agency's authority over carbon emissions bring bearing on our college's hard work to provide a safe living and learning environment and core value of sustainability. The importance that all members of our college community engage in constructive conversations, carry out our role and responsibility to be informed and engaged citizens, and participate in elections cannot be understated.

I hope that you enjoyed time with loved ones, favorite activities or special places over the summer. I also hope you are excited to either begin your journey at SUNY Oneonta or reunite with your fellow Red Dragons and reconnect with faculty and staff. I know I am excited for you to be here, and I look forward to seeing you across campus and at the many great events that we have in store.

Have a wonderful start of the semester.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear colleagues,

I hope your summer has provided a season for replenishment and revitalization through time off or time to reconnect with loved ones, favorite activities or special places. We will, very soon, be back in the excitement of a new academic year, so reloading our energy reserves and enthusiasm is critical. As we approach the new academic year and fall semester activities, I want to highlight a few significant items and updates.

Although many outside of higher education may think that after commencement work is done here at the college for a few months, the reality is that we are very busy during the summer. The vice presidents provided me with an extensive list of the work carried out (and still ongoing) this summer. The list is too long to include here, but please know that the work is both recognized and sincerely appreciated - not only by me, but by the students and their families, both new and returning. They will observe and experience that we are prepared to meet expectations, support them and help them achieve their goals.

If you have been on campus, you have likely noticed the work to keep our grounds and buildings in pristine condition thanks to the excellent work of our grounds crew, facilities and maintenance staff. Facilities has also been busy overseeing multiple projects including, but not limited to, a major multiyear site project for ADA accessibility, continued work on the Alumni Hall project, renovations in Hays and Matteson Halls, the installation of a new sign at the West Street campus entrance, the addition of pedestrian crossing safety equipment and, in coordination with OAS/Sodexo, development of a new dining venue, Simple Servings, an allergen-free zone opening this fall in Wilsbach Hall. Academic Affairs has been hard at work block-presetting schedules for the incoming first-year students, refining the division's work on student success, planning for our next general education program, and continuing our Middle States self-study. We saw a return to faculty-led global programs and had over 40 students participate in undergraduate research and creative activities. Information Technology Services has been completing projects to improve our WI-FI network, data security and classroom technology, and reallocating computer lab resources based on trending demands. Colleagues in Student Affairs resurrected our summer orientation program, in which over 700 new students completed the Day One orientation session in July. The reviews for the summer Day One sessions clearly show a deep appreciation of the college-wide welcome. We also welcomed back summer camps, and Athletics was busy with various summer programs. The Division of College Advancement, in collaboration with over 20 other departments and offices, started the summer with a very successful Alumni Weekend in early June. The event brought about 750 alumni and friends back to campus, and their positive observations and sentiments about their experience and everything happening at the college were universal.

We begin this semester seeing progress on several initiatives related to the Regaining Momentum Agenda. We have:

• established a Student Success Leadership Team with the goal of purposefully coordinating our retention efforts;
• begun the first training of the Faculty Academy - a faculty professional development program about inclusive pedagogies;
• expanded the number of experiential learning opportunities - with the highest number of summer undergraduate research participants ever this year;
• raised 90 percent of the funds needed to meet the goal of endowing the Student Emergency Fund;
• held two meetings of the new Regional Innovation Council;
• provided preliminary funding to several projects designed to support student success and community building, both on campus and off;
• and begun the process of adjusting the course schedule so that, beginning in Spring 2023, the college will have a couple of hours when classes are not scheduled and designated as common meeting times. This is a strategic initiative to strengthen the opportunities for us to come together as a community and engage in collective discussions on critical college issues, as well provide additional opportunities for events and activities that celebrate our college community.

As a way to continue building on the momentum from last year’s dialogue sessions, we will aim to have at least one session per month this year.

Several times last semester, I indicated that the New York State Education Department Board of Regents changed the criteria for institutions to qualify for status as a university in the fall of 2021. Under the new criteria, SUNY Oneonta already qualifies to be recognized as a university. There are over 10 private institutions in the state that have already made this change, and all but two of our sister institutions (SUNY regional comprehensive colleges) are requesting university designation. This issue will likely be taken up at the SUNY Board of Trustees meeting in September. Designation as a university will strengthen the future of our institution and we are already operating as one according to the Board of Regents’ guidelines. I will present about our intentions to request university designation from the SUNY Board of Trustees during my report at the Aug. 29 Senate meeting, and then at dialogue and open forum on Aug. 31. I invite all employees to attend either meeting to learn more about what this means and provide feedback. Our moniker and branding would still remain “SUNY Oneonta,” but our official name on record would no longer contain “College at Oneonta.”

I would like to conclude by advising the campus about recent re-organizations and assignments intended to strengthen our operations. The first is the addition of Dia Carleton to the President’s Cabinet where she will provide representation of, and input regarding, personnel matters during discussions. Second is an expanded role for Karen Brown who is now serving as our Senior Enrollment Officer and Executive Director of Admissions and will oversee the Student Success Leadership Team. Lastly, to better represent her everyday work and responsibilities (which will still include internal communications), Karyn Wendrow’s title has been changed to Deputy Chief of Staff and Director of Executive Communication.

SUNY Oneonta is a community that we should all feel proud to be associated with and part of. This does not mean that there is not work to do – there always will be, so that we can continue to realize a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. But it is also a place that, because of everyone’s hard work and commitment, stands in a very strong position to flourish and continue being a source of pride for generations to come.

I look forward to our continued collective work this coming year.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Today, we recognize the significance of Juneteenth in our nation's history and celebrate freedom and equity.

Opal Lee, known as the grandmother of Juneteenth, says that, "Juneteenth means freedom for everybody."

Opal is credited with helping to initiate the movement to make Juneteenth a national holiday. Between Sept. 2016 and Jan. 2017, she walked from Fort Worth, TX to Washington D.C. in a symbolic act calling for Juneteenth to become a national holiday. She walked 2.5 miles at a time, representing the 2.5 years it took Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger to arrive in Texas to inform some of the last enslaved people of the end of the Civil War after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued in Jan. 1863. He arrived in Galveston, TX on June 19, 1865.

Opal was 90 years old when she completed her walk to Washington, and was a special guest at the signing ceremony when the bill to make Juneteenth a federal holiday was signed into law by President Biden last year. She has also been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize and is a driving force behind the planned National Juneteenth Museum in Texas.

Opal's story is a reminder that it is never too late, and no actions are too small, to make a difference. I hope everyone takes time to honor and celebrate this meaningful holiday.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear SUNY Oneonta Community,

Our state experienced a horrendous tragedy yesterday with the loss of ten New Yorkers as a result of a racist act of violence in Buffalo. The SUNY Oneonta community stands in solidarity with everyone who has been affected by the shooting and grieves for the victims and their families. We denounce not only the violence, but the hateful motivation and prejudice that fueled it.

As we support one another through this upsetting time, let us also stand together to condemn the intolerance and brutality displayed by this criminal act and others like it across our nation and the world. Our community’s commitment to valuing diversity, equity and inclusion is a critical antidote to bigotry and extremism.

For anyone who may be experiencing distress and would like support, or those who may simply want to talk through thoughts and feelings surrounding this terrible event, please reach out to the resources available to you at the college. Staff from the Counseling Center are available to talk with students and provide assistance. Faculty and staff can reach out to the Employee Assistance Program for referrals and resources.

Please also remember that the SUNY Oneonta Bias Acts Response Team and University Police are available to respond to incidents within our college community.

Today, I ask for us all to commit to contributing to a community, not only within our college, but also in our town, our region and our society, that fosters justice, kindness and peace.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Five Faculty & Staff Receive SUNY Chancellor's Awards for Excellence

I am proud to announce that five members of our faculty and staff have been named recipients of the 2022 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence. Please join me in congratulating Dr. Simona Giura, Rebecca O'Donnell, Dr. Sarah Portway, Dr. Sasha Ramlal and Dr. William Wilkerson.

These members of our college community are leaders in their disciplines who have excelled in the areas of teaching, scholarship and service to the institution. Read more about them and their accomplishments at the link below.

Learn More About Our Recipients

This is the highest honor for faculty and staff in SUNY, and our recipients will be recognized during commencement exercises on Saturday, May 21. Simona, Rebecca, Sarah, Sasha and William are most deserving of receiving this distinction, and I am proud to call them colleagues.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

As we wrap up the 2021-2022 academic year, I want to extend my best wishes for finals and the end of the semester. We have had a productive year, and I thank you for your contributions in helping it to be a safe and successful one. Have a healthy and energizing summer.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Read Transcript: Spring 2022 End-of-Year Message

May is here and we have just a few days before classes and finals are over and the 2021-2022 academic year is in the books. It is hard for me to believe that I joined the SUNY Oneonta community just eight months ago. My deepest appreciation for being such a welcoming community.

After attending many meetings, competitions, productions and ceremonies, I feel genuinely connected to both the on and off campus community. The opportunity to see first-hand what makes SUNY Oneonta such a wonderful place has been inspiring.

While this is the time of year we often look ahead to plans for the summer and the next year, I encourage you to take a moment to look back on all that we have accomplished this year.

The careful attention to COVID protocol and consideration for your fellow Red Dragons helped us have two successful semesters with in-person instruction, events and activities. I remain very much in awe by both the resilience and the flexibility demonstrated by everyone on campus. It was hard, but it has meant giving our students an experience that had been missing for over a year.

A few of the many bright spots we’ve seen this year include:

• welcoming the class of 2020 back to campus for an in-person graduation celebration, a return to scholarly events like the Mills Distinguished Lecture the Student Research and Creativity Showcase, and co-curricular events such as musical performances, theatre productions, athletic competitions and entertainment events like O-Fest.
• The college also served the region by serving as a community COVID testing site for several months during the winter.
• We saw outstanding collaboration and community mindedness and that helped us through an unexpected power outage this spring.
• We broke a record during the Powered By You giving challenge which generated more than 221 thousand dollars in donations to support students and the college community.
• I’m especially grateful to all who participated in the institutional dialogue sessions that helped form the Regaining Momentum Agenda which will help guide our collective actions over the next 18 months. It was a privilege to hear from everyone and learn more about what makes our college a great place and about the opportunities we have to advance.

It has been a privilege getting to know all of you, and my appreciation goes to every student, staff, and faculty member for your effort and contributions this year. I hope you can fill your summer with activities that energize you and I thank you again for a wonderful year.

Four Students Receive 2022 SUNY Chancellor's Award

I am proud to announce our 2022 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence recipients, Alyssa Carbone, Gabrielle Cecere, Alexa Laska, and Teresa Lopez-Long.

These scholars have excelled academically, been exemplary leaders and dedicated extensive amounts of their time and energy to several organizations, committees and initiatives during their time at SUNY Oneonta. Read more about Alyssa, Gabrielle, Alexa and Teresa and their accomplishments at the link below.

Learn More About Our Recipients

​​​They were four of only 180 students across the SUNY system who received the award this year and were honored at a ceremony in Saratoga Springs today.

Please join me in congratulating Alyssa, Gabrielle, Alexa and Teresa on this well-deserved honor.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear colleagues,

I am pleased to announce the agenda that has resulted from our collective efforts during the dialogue sessions this spring. "Regaining Momentum: An Agenda for SUNY Oneonta" outlines the integrated approach and cross-cutting principles that will steer our actions over the next 18 months as we agree on and accomplish some or all of the strategic opportunities listed within the document.

The full agenda, background information and links to the notes and materials from the dialogue sessions are available on the Regaining Momentum webpage.

Information about applying for funding to support efforts related to the strategic opportunities will be distributed soon. I encourage everyone to think about ways that you and your department can contribute to accomplishing the opportunities and resulting plans or projects. Updates and information will be shared as we proceed through the next year-and-a-half.

Yesterday I gave a brief presentation about the agenda and would like to reiterate my thanks to everyone who dedicated attention and energy to this important process over the past 10 weeks. As the agenda indicates, we are approaching these opportunities from a position of strength, and I am excited about what lies ahead. With collaboration and consistency, endeavors both big and small will have a positive impact, build trust and help keep us moving forward.

Sincerely
Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Over the last week and a half we have watched the Russian government continue with an unrestrained invasion of Ukraine.

As a community, our thoughts are with all who are directly impacted by this act of aggression and all forms of aggression across the world. As an institution of higher education that values and works toward global interconnectedness, we echo these words of the Dalai-Lama: “We need to develop a sense of the oneness of humanity…. this is how we will build a more peaceful world." As a group of educators and learners, we ask all members of our community to engage in conversations with one another about these current events and other conflicts across the world that minimize any person’s humanity.

In order to further our mission of open discussion and debate, an event supported by the divisions of Academic Affairs and Student Affairs will be held on Wednesday evening. All are invited to attend the conversation titled "Making Sense of the Unthinkable: A Roundtable Discussion of the Russian Invasion of Ukraine," on March 9 at 7 p.m. in the atrium of the Physical Science building. The program will feature the expertise of faculty from SUNY Oneonta and Hartwick College and opportunities for all to examine and engage. Special thanks goes to the Political Science department for organizing this important conversation.

Counseling, mental health services and other resources for support in processing all that we are hearing and seeing about the conflict are available to students through the Counseling Center and to employees through the Employee Assistance Program.

There are also many in our community who would like to support those in need due to this crisis. The U.S. State Department has information on its website on how to help.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear colleagues,

As we are all busy preparing for the beginning of another semester, I want to welcome you all to Spring 2022. Please watch the video above and review the Planning Dialogue Lib Guide, which houses a copy of the invitation to the upcoming dialogue sessions and corresponding planning documents. I look forward to seeing you throughout the upcoming weeks and months.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Read Transcript: Spring 2022 Welcome and Dialogue Session Reminder

Hello. First of all, I'd like to wish you all a happy New Year. I, as you, hope that this new year brings us continued optimism for the future of our college. I also hope that you were able to enjoy the break in a way that helped you replenish your energies as we begin a new semester.

As you know, our plans are to start classes on Wednesday in an in person format. The current trends in the state's COVID incidents and the re-entry plans that we have instituted, which includes required boosters, testing, and masking - sets us up well to have a successful opening of the semester. It will continue to be all of our responsibility to ensure that we all abide by our guidance and prevention policies so that we can have a safe completion of the spring semester. I look forward to attending the wide array of events planned for the semester starting with the speakers that have been scheduled to commemorate Martin Luther King Day and Black History Month. I look forward to seeing you at these events and others throughout the semester.

As I begin my second semester here, I've invited the campus to a series of campus dialogues to help me set an agenda for the next 18 months. Included in the email that I sent with this video is a link to the electronic site that has the invitation as well as the background information. As I say in the invitation, the college needs a strategic plan. However, we as a campus are not in a position to engage in such a process at this time. So the hope is that through these dialogues, the campus collectively can assist me as well, as the whole campus, in completing a list of the strategic opportunities that can guide the colleges work until we initiate a strategic planning process in about 18 months.

I thank you for your continued commitment to our students and I look forward to seeing you soon at one of the dialogues, or all the dialogues, and at other campus events. Have a wonderful weekend.

Dear colleagues,

Let me first wish you and your families a happy new year.

As we approach the beginning of the spring semester, we are all clearly concerned with the current state of the pandemic. I want to assure you that the COVID Response Team (CRT) continues to regularly monitor the trends in the state as well as guidance emanating from SUNY, the Department of Health and the Governor’s office. Please continue to watch for and review messages from the CRT as we prepare for our in-person start on Jan. 26.

In addition to responding to the challenges posed by the pandemic, it is critical that we continue to prepare the college for the coming years, as higher education faces new and continuing challenges.

I want to invite you to take part in a collective dialogue about strategic opportunities that the college should focus on over the next 18 months. You can review a more in-depth invitation and document that provides additional information about the dialogues and planning process, or you may go directly to the Planning Dialogue Lib Guide, which will give you access to the invitation and all other corresponding documents.

As we begin the new semester, we as a college and as part of the higher education sector will not only face challenges but also, more excitingly, opportunities to strengthen our institution. In a time of national uncertainty, SUNY Oneonta can be a source of continuity, an example of determination and a beacon of optimism.

Let us engage collectively and not merely as a community of individuals. Thank you for your continued commitment to our students.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, PhD MPH
President

Reflecting on Jan. 6, 2021, One Year Later

As a college, we are a cornerstone of educational opportunity and are committed to educating future generations of our society. This means making sure we partner with, and respond to the needs of, our local communities, and it also signifies a responsibility to strive for a truly open democracy. We will accomplish this by continuing to ensure that our graduates are informed, analytical and engaged members of our cities and towns, states, country and world.

As we mark the one-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection at our nation's Capitol, let us all recommit ourselves to the objectives listed above. This responsibility is not new, and many before us saw the danger of what can happen by not committing to these objectives. In 1947, President Truman's Commission on Higher Education stated that a college education provides "the means to a more abundant personal life and a stronger, freer social order." As an institution of higher education enveloped in the liberal arts, it is particularly important for us to use the events of last year to remind ourselves that the actions we — faculty, staff and students — take are the building blocks of our country’s continuous efforts toward a more perfect democracy.

Today is a day to not only reflect, but also to dedicate ourselves to what we can be: a more inclusive and freer democracy.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

As of today (Nov. 22, 2021), I have been on campus 73 days - a flash of time in comparison to the institutional timelines that govern the life, culture and character of an institution, especially an institution with the rich history of SUNY Oneonta.

During my interviews with the search committee, campus community, SUNY Board of Trustees and the Chancellor’s office, I made it clear that I believed the college stood on strong foundations. Over the last 10 weeks, this has become even more evident to me after completing the following actions:

• ​​​​​reviewing the institution’s historical enrollment data,
• visiting high school counselors across the state,
• having conversations with dozens, yes dozens, of alumni I have been able to encounter,
• hearing stories from students and faculty of how funds from our donors distributed through our foundation have helped them advance their education and careers,
• attending art exhibitions, plays, dance performances, cultural events and athletic competitions,
• sitting in on academic and scholarly lectures,
• interacting with students at the summer research showcase and during the visit with the Chancellor to our Counseling, Health and Wellness Center and Experiential Learning Center,
• holding dialogues with recent retirees,
• listening to faculty and staff during multiple forums and, most importantly,
• listening to students throughout the different meetings and forums held this semester.

I list these not as evidence of me being busy but as tangible indicators of the talent, capacity and commitment generated by all of you.

The pride every student and employee I spoke with has in being a member of the Red Dragon community was unmistakable. Those conversations made it evident that this community understands the value of public education and the transformational role that SUNY Oneonta has the opportunity to play in every student’s future.

I have, throughout my career, had the privilege to be closely involved with three other state systems of higher education, and just last week I was at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities’ Presidents and Chancellors meeting. Using perspectives from these experiences, it is very clear that this institution is in a stronger position in terms of enrollment, finance, academic reputation and student experience than many regional comprehensive colleges across the country.

Therefore, the question to ask ourselves is not, “Does our institution have the assets to address the challenges facing us?” Nor is it, “Do we have to restructure the institution so we can prepare for the future?” It’s a much easier question: “How do we remind ourselves of, refocus our efforts on and recreate what was already here - a strong community of educators working collectively to serve our students and the broader community in the aspiration of a brighter future?”

Of course, there are national and regional challenges ahead of us that will require us to assess some of our practices, some of which include:

• a public that is more skeptical of the benefits of public higher education,
• a decline in the population of high school students, particularly in the northeast,
• incoming students who are more diverse and have taken novel paths to higher education,
• K-12 school systems that perpetuate an opportunity gap among under-represented student groups, and
• for the next several years, incoming classes of first-year students who lost over 18 months of in-classroom instruction during their high school careers.

My style as a higher education administrator has been to approach complex problems such as these through a collective impact approach. The concept of collective impact hinges on the idea that in order for organizations to create lasting solutions to large-scale problems, they must coordinate their efforts and work together around a common agenda using a structured form of collaboration and strong, continuous communication.

I believe our institution is well placed to engage in collective endeavors.

The high-impact opportunities provided to our students through the Experiential Learning Center, the broad range of student development programming we offer, governance bodies such as the College Senate and its committees and, most importantly, our strong academic programs all demonstrate that the college already knows how to collaborate.

In terms of communication, last year a taskforce on internal communication was created which has since become a presidential advisory committee. This group, along with my office, has been actively working to strengthen the institution’s internal communication practices.

Finally, the common agenda. I am aware that the institution does not currently have a strategic plan, which I believe is important in order to form the foundation of a common agenda. However, I am also aware that there is institutional fatigue with the implementation of new initiatives and plans. Therefore, I do not believe it is wise to engage in a strategic planning process at this time. Instead, there are a series of documents and plans in existence that I believe can serve as the foundation for what I would like to call "a process of institutional priority checkup." The idea is to use all the existing plans and documents to collectively identify a set of institutional priorities that can help us align our work for the next 18-24 months until the institution is prepared for a new strategic plan.

Over the next few weeks, before we depart for the winter break, I plan to discuss this idea with the appropriate governance groups, but I do not envision a heavy lift or an overly-structured process or product. Instead, the process could be a continuation of the presidential transition process - the creation of forums and spaces where the different constituent groups, taking the priorities already set out in the existing documents as a starting point, can provide feedback and input to establish a broad set of institutional priorities.

Out of these talks, I hope we can identify areas of focus that build upon three main themes. These themes recur across various existing documents and are key for us in facing and prevailing over the external challenges I previously mentioned.

• First, prioritizing the strengthening of a student-centered teaching and learning environment. As our incoming students not only change demographically, the pre-baccalaureate experiences of all students will have had an 18-month curtailment that will impact their college readiness. We must be prepared with a renewed focus on professional development in teaching and learning, so that we all may serve as effective educators to these students. This development and practice must always be based on a bolstered culture of inquiry, service and scholarship.
• Second, continuing our unwavering commitment to ensuring that institutional goals for diversity, equity and inclusion are integrated into all plans and efforts. On a personal level, I want to make it clear that I am committed to making SUNY Oneonta, and the broader Oneonta community, a place where there is no space for hate, discrimination or bigotry of any kind.
• Third, facilitating an increase in students’ engagement throughout their collegiate experience. This is what Peter Felton of Elon University calls a “relentless welcome” (The Relationship Rich Education, 2020). Felton’s work demonstrates the importance of providing students with a welcoming environment where they can make connections. The literature shows that the greater the number of connections made by a student, the greater the likelihood for the student’s success in terms of retention, progress toward graduation and post-graduation outcomes.

I am looking forward to further conversations that will help us continue to align our work over the next 18 months.

As a way to initiate activity and advance movement around these identified institutional priorities, we will use them to help guide a process for funding strategic initiatives. The funding will be provided for up to three years. Like similar processes previously enacted, this will be guided by the College Budget Committee. Information about the priorities and funding process will be available in the middle of the spring semester.

I understand that many individuals in our community are feeling disconnected and weary, and that there are many factors that contribute to this. Clearly the exercise of returning to in-person work and learning has been taxing, but there are also other challenges. There is the pressure of trying to find a sustainable balance between work and a personal life; growing economic pressures of an increased cost of living coupled with income that is not keeping pace; a constant level of uncertainty related to the path of the pandemic, and finally, changes in the way we teach, work and learn.

As president, I want to work with other college administration leaders, college governance, our bargaining units and the student body to collectively identify solutions. The issues I’ve discussed are structural issues that will not be resolved by just one of us. We must all become enfranchised in finding the solutions. The college leadership has already made commitments to begin this process.

First, we have been approving, and will continue to approve, searches for positions that will help alleviate the growing workload in many areas. Two I want to highlight are the searches for two counselors for our Counseling, Health and Wellness Center, and the searches for 22 faculty positions.

Second, we are proposing the creation of a taskforce in collaboration with the bargaining units that will begin in the spring to evaluate the starting salaries of faculty and staff as well as address issues of salary inversion and compression.

Third, the divisional leaders and I will be assessing our current telecommuting pilot program and identifying ways it may be able to grow and provide a mechanism for greater work flexibility and effective outcomes.

Fourth, the Health and Wellness Committee will be proposing various initiatives to continue to apply a comprehensive level of attention to the wellbeing of our entire campus.

Finally, if our college is going to help counter the growing skepticism of the value and benefits of public higher education, we must strive to be good stewards of place. This means that we must leverage SUNY Oneonta’s values of service, scholarship and sustainability to strengthen ties with our host communities and serve as a vital anchor institution in the continued development of our region. Our external partners will be part of forums in the spring so that we can begin to bring these key external voices into the discussion and discern the areas of coordination, collaboration and integration. SUNY Oneonta should strive not only to be in Oneonta, but to be of Oneonta. The relationship between the institution and the community is, I believe, not merely a partnership, but rather a symbiotic collusion in which the host city’s future and the institution’s future are inextricably linked.

I want to thank you for the time allotted to me and thank you for listening, and I want to conclude by also thanking all of you and the broader community for welcoming my wife, Rachel, and me to Oneonta. We have found ourselves feeling at home very quickly, so much so that just yesterday we added a new member of the college community – Yeobo, a five-month-old puppy.

Thank you, and have a wonderful Thanksgiving and end to the semester.

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Giving Thanks

This week, many of us will take time to enjoy the company of friends and loved ones, and it is also a time to reflect. While managing new routines and overcoming challenges in our studies, work and personal lives, we have persevered toward a successful semester. I thank you for your dedication and hope you can find time to pause and relax.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Read Transcript: A Thanksgiving Message from President Cardelle

Hello Red Dragons. Before the beginning of the holiday season and before the frenzy and excitement of the end of the semester I want to share with you a few reflections about this past semester.

At a personal level, I want to let you know that I am incredibly thankful to have become a member of the SUNY Oneonta college community -- a group of talented students, engaged faculty, committed staff, and supportive friends. I feel privileged to have found a community committed to the dissemination and creation of knowledge, and to the development of a transformative learning community.

I also want to encourage all of you to consider the impact you as individuals, and our collective efforts, have had on the lives of those who call SUNY Oneonta home. This college, which encompasses the passion, commitment, and efforts of all, returned from a year like no other. While many challenges still lie ahead, this community overcame obstacles and capitalized on the underlying benefits and opportunities that can only be found in an academic community.

I can tell you that I have heard from many students about how grateful they are to be back learning, growing, thriving and living together on campus. I encourage you to think about this gratitude and more importantly about the strength of spirit that achieved it.

You should all be proud of contributing to the well-being of every Red Dragon and I offer you all my warmest wishes for a safe and peaceful Thanksgiving.

Today, SUNY Oneonta is participating in a very special nation-wide event, the annual National First-Generation College Celebration. Members of our college community who are the in the first-generation of their family to earn a bachelor’s degree are being spotlighted on our website and social media all day long. I encourage you to take a moment to read about our first-generation students, faculty, staff and alumni and their hard work, resiliency and incredible achievements.

Meet First-Generation Red Dragons

To support current and prospective first-generation students and families, the college has created a webpage with academic and financial aid information and resources, and short profiles of more than 25 SUNY Oneonta first-generation students, faculty, staff and alumni. I am also pleased to announce the establishment of our own chapter of Alpha Alpha Alpha, the national first-generation honor society. Our first group of honorees will be inducted in the spring. Lastly, you can stop by one of the celebration tables in Hunt Union, Fitzelle Hall, Wilsbach Hall, or the quad today to get a celebration button, refreshments, and information on resources for first-generation students.

My thanks goes to those who organized our celebration as well as the many Red Dragons who shared their stories. Your experiences are inspiring and help to better educate us on what it means to be first-generation, the systemic barriers plaguing higher education, and the supports needed for first-generation students to access, and succeed at, college.

As you know, ensuring equitable access to a quality education is of the utmost importance to me and many others at SUNY Oneonta. I hope you will join us in celebrating our first-generation Red Dragons today.

Sincerely,

​​​​​​

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

​​​​

Dear Red Dragons,

As we approach the October break, I thank you all for your efforts to follow COVID guidelines and help keep the number of cases among our campus community low. These efforts are working, so the COVID Response Team is in the process of reviewing the campus and residence hall visitor policies and will provide details on any updates next week.

If you are planning to travel or gather with others over the break, please use caution and your best judgement. Protect yourself and others by wearing a mask in social situations, and get tested if you feel sick or have been exposed to someone who is positive for COVID.

If you begin to show symptoms over the break, get tested immediately. The Counseling, Health and Wellness Center will be closed over the weekend and on Monday, Oct. 11, but will resume normal operating hours on Tuesday, Oct. 12. You should contact your primary care provider or get tested at a local pharmacy or testing site if you need a test while the Health Center is closed.

Everyone is encouraged to participate in the on-campus surveillance testing upon your return to campus in case you came into contact with COVID and to prevent spread by any asymptomatic spread. The on-campus testing center in Morris Conference Center will have adjusted hours due to the break:

• Sunday, Oct. 10: 4 - 8 p.m.
• Tuesday, Oct. 12: 4 - 8 p.m.
• Wednesday, Oct. 13: 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
• Sunday, Oct. 17: 1 - 8 p.m.

Next week we will be halfway through the semester, and I am confident we will all continue to work together to help our community remain safe and healthy. I hope you enjoy some well-deserved time off!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

This Saturday will mark 20 years since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on our nation. Nearly 3,000 lives were lost in the attacks, including seven members of our SUNY Oneonta alumni family. Many of us still remember the shock, grief and sadness of that day. It is hard to believe that two decades have already passed.

As we witnessed tragedy on 9/11, we were also witness to acts of selflessness, cooperation, unity and love. Those who responded to the scenes of the attacks, and countless others who supported victims and their families over time, remind us that there are heroes among us and that, by working together, we are stronger.

The SUNY Oneonta Alumni Association will host the college’s annual remembrance ceremony tomorrow, Friday, Sept. 10, at 9 a.m. at the 9/11 memorial sculpture on the upper quad outside of Fitzelle Hall. The event is open to everyone and will feature special music, the University Police Department's honor guard, and a presentation of a wreath and flowers. Masks and social distancing are encouraged for all who attend.

Milne Library is also hosting an educational exhibit, September 11, 2001: The Day That Changed the World, featuring archival photographs and images of artifacts from the 9/11 Memorial and Museum. This exhibit is available to view through Sept. 30 on the third floor of the library, outside of the Alden Room.

I encourage everyone to reach out to a friend, family member or colleague who might need extra support as we approach this significant anniversary. Collectively, we can honor the memory of those we lost and commemorate the resiliency of our communities and our nation.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​​

Sept. 7 message to students

Sept. 7 message to employees

Sept. 7 message to families

Sept. 7 message to alumni

Read Transcript: SUNY Oneonta Presidential Transition

Dennis Craig: Hello, Red Dragons! August is here and the college is gearing up to welcome our new and continuing students in just a few short weeks. That also means that my time as acting president is winding down. As you know, a new president has been named to begin in a permanent role starting in September.

Dr. Alberto Cardelle and I have already begun meeting and I believe his passion and commitment to student success, diversity, equity, and inclusion, and public health are among many characteristics that will serve our college well for years to come.

Serving as acting president for the last ten months has been a privilege and I am proud to have been part of such a resilient community. Students, faculty, staff and alumni all banded together to support one another during a tenuous time by remaining true to the supportive community that Oneonta has always been. My sincere thanks for the hard work put in by everyone across the college.

I will continue to serve as acting president until September 3. Until then, we have much that we will accomplish together in the weeks ahead as we prepare for the fall semester. Our work continues to move forward on improving communication, planning graduation activities for the classes of 2020 and 2021, and focusing on enrollment initiatives that bring Oneonta back to the environment we enjoyed prior to the pandemic. Please stay tuned for important updates and ways you can support these efforts and stay informed in the weeks ahead.

After my departure, I will continue to be invested in the success of SUNY Oneonta and offer my continued support as a colleague and friend.

It is now my pleasure to introduce Dr. Alberto Cardelle, who is very eager to officially arrive on campus next month.

Dr. Alberto Cardelle: Hello SUNY Oneonta! I am so pleased to have a chance to introduce myself, express my gratitude and briefly present my plans for when I arrive on campus.

First, I would like to thank Acting President Craig for those kind words and to acknowledge how very appreciative I am for his willingness to generously share of his time, counsel and support as I prepare to join the Red Dragon family next month.

It is very clear that this community has been working hard over the past year to overcome significant challenges. Most importantly it is clear that you have been supporting one another to stay on track and remain a strong academic institution. Your strength of spirit is admirable, and I feel privileged to have the opportunity to work with individuals who are so kind, committed, and passionate.
I pursued this role because of my belief in the transformative role of public higher education, a commitment to equity and a strong sense of optimism about the potential future generations hold to continue to improve our world.

And I plan to use those principles to direct my work with you in achieving the collective vision of this institution. During this first year I hope to first of all implement the thorough plans already developed to ensure that we complete the academic year safely. I will also want to spend time meeting with all of you listening. This will help me better work with you in setting out a plan for rebuilding a sense of community both on campus and in the city and town of Oneonta.

I can’t wait to meet you all in person and introduce you to my family – my wife Dr. Rachel Frick Cardelle, and my daughters Marianela, Catalina and Josephine.

I have heard a lot about the vibrant student life, quality academic programs and the many campus traditions. It is an honor to be joining your community and I will continue to stay in touch throughout the next month and I look forward to all that we will accomplish together.

From Sept. 15 - Oct. 15, we celebrate Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month. This celebration is not just a recognition of a particular heritage but an affirmation of the values that are the foundation of our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. At SUNY Oneonta, we believe that diversity is an asset and a source of strength that energizes our collective growth and innovation.

Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month allows us to celebrate diversity and renew our commitment to creating an inclusive and equitable environment for all. In addition, this month-long celebration serves as an inspiration for future generations. It showcases representative role models who prove that one's heritage should never be a barrier to success. Finally, the month reminds us of common humanity. It reinforces that, beneath our different backgrounds and experiences, we are all part of a shared history.

In addition to the Parade of Nations and Fiesta held on Sept. 15 to kick off the month, there are many activities and events planned for us to engage, learn, and celebrate together.

• Keynote & Poetry Workshop featuring SUNY Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, Ricardo Nazario y Colón:
  Friday, Sept. 22, 12 p.m. in Craven Lounge, Morris Conference Center.
  
  Dr. Ricardo Nazario y Colón will deliver a keynote address and public reading of his poetry collection "The Moor of the Bronx" from 12 - 1:30 p.m. He will also host a poetry workshop from 2 - 3 p.m.
• Latinx Heritage Concert featuring Alex Torres and his Latin Orchestra:
  Friday, Sept. 22, 6 p.m. in the Quad
• Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Festival:
  Friday, Oct. 13, 3 p.m. in the Center for Racial Justice and Inclusive Excellence, Lee Hall
• A block party, paint & sip, and other Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month-themed events are being offered by various student clubs and organizations.

Thank you for being a part of our shared journey of celebrating diversity, fostering unity, and making SUNY Oneonta a better place to learn, work and live.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President

Success of the Grow. Thrive. Live. The Future of Oneonta Fundraising Campaign Will Benefit All

This summer, SUNY Oneonta's largest comprehensive fundraising campaign, Grow. Thrive. Live. The Future of SUNY Oneonta, came to a close. This is a historic occasion because the campaign is the university's most successful fundraising effort in our 134-year history.

With an original goal of raising $25 million in five years, more than $33.2 million was raised in gifts, grants, pledges, and estate planning commitments. More than 10,000 people donated to the SUNY Oneonta Foundation during the campaign, establishing 152 new scholarships and student program support funds.

The funds raised during this campaign will have far-reaching benefits all across our university. Admissions can assure prospective students about the availability of financial assistance far into the future. Enrolled students are provided with a source of emergency funding for unforeseen expenditures and opportunities to engage in internships, global education and student research. Faculty will benefit from professional development funding. Ultimately, the success of this campaign shows the passion generated by our alumni, staff, faculty, students and all other donors when asked to support our mission of “Nurturing a community where students grow intellectually, thrive socially and live purposefully” and the future of public higher education.

We know many of you donated, and we are grateful for the generosity of our university community. Every donation to Grow. Thrive. Live. is providing new and expanded funding for student scholarships, program support and more.

Grow. Thrive. Live. started with a silent launch in 2018 and then launched publicly in January 2020. The campaign’s original $25 million goal was surpassed 15 months ahead of schedule in early 2022. At that time, the SUNY Oneonta Foundation Board of Directors announced three new stretch goals for the remainder of the campaign:

1. Fully endow the SUNY Oneonta Student Emergency Fund with $1 million.
2. Establish at least 25 additional endowed scholarships or student support funds.
3. Increase the unrestricted portion of the SUNY Oneonta Foundation endowment.

Grow. Thrive. Live. was led by campaign co-chairs Linda ’76 and Pat ’75 McCann from Newtown, PA. Through their leadership and personal generosity, Linda and Pat fully embraced the opportunity to lead an effort that would permanently enhance access to an affordable and inclusive SUNY Oneonta education.

When the COVID-19 pandemic reached the United States only two months after the public launch, swift and thoughtful decision-making by the McCann’s—alongside the SUNY Oneonta Foundation Board of Directors—temporarily shifted the campaign’s fundraising focus to the university’s Student Emergency Fund. This shift in focus resonated with the entire SUNY Oneonta community and helped to ensure that $50,000 annually was, and will continue to be, provided to support students facing unforeseen emergencies.

Charitable gifts of all sizes powered the success of Grow. Thrive. Live., from the campaign’s largest commitment of more than $1 million to thousands of gifts of $100 or less. SUNY Oneonta alumni from eight decades supported the campaign, along with donors from all 50 states and seven countries. Through a collective effort, we have maximized support for our students and are addressing the university's greatest needs. Thank you to everyone!

For more information about the Grow. Thrive. Live. campaign and its impact on the university, please visit the campaign website.

With sincere appreciation,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President
Paul J. Adamo, Vice President for University Advancement and Executive Director of the SUNY Oneonta Foundation

Good afternoon, my name is Alberto Jose Cardelle and I have the honor to serve as President of this notable institution, and it is my pleasure to welcome you to SUNY Oneonta’s Academic Convocation for the 138th graduating class. By the way, that means you class of 2027!

I know some of you are transferring here and joining us with some college experience already, but this message is equally as important for you, no matter when you will graduate 2027, 2026 or 2025.

Before I continue, I would like to introduce the members of the stage party who will not be introduced later in the program. Please stand when I call your name.
Mr. Paul Adamo – Vice President for University Advancement and Executive Director, of the SUNY Oneonta Foundation
Ms. Julie Piscitello – Vice President of Finance and Administration
Dr. Bernadette Tiapo –Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer
Dr. Tracy Allen – Dean of the School of Sciences
Dr. Mark Davies – Dean of the School of Education, Human Ecology and Sports Studies
Dr. Keith Jones – Associate Professor of Mathematics, Presiding Officer of the Faculty and Chair of the College Senate

Students, today you join a community where hundreds of thousands of students have come before you. Like you will do during your time on campus, they experienced both success and difficulties. What will always help you overcome the challenges and celebrate the successes is remembering why you are here.

Your peers and fellow Red Dragons that have taken this journey for the previous 134 years were here in times of war, in times of disease, in times of economic hardship, and in times of civil unrest. They may have been part of fraternities and sororities, part of an athletic team, part of student government, part of clubs and honor societies, and yes others may have come just for the social scene. But if you peel all of that back, they all came to SUNY Oneonta for the same thing - an education and to be part of an academic community.

And by education I do not mean the memorization of facts. By education I don’t mean being able to spit back up in an essay exactly what you heard in class. And, by education I don’t merely mean a diploma.

After all, (takes out phone) you can google most if not all of the world’s facts or those that you will discuss in class. You can ask chatGPT to write you a mediocre passionless essay on almost any topic, and for the right price I am sure you may even be able to get yourself a diploma.

By education I mean the development of your higher-order cognitive skills; your understanding and appreciation of aesthetic, cultural, historical and intellectual concerns; your ability to better handle the problematic issues facing our society; and your ability to develop and appreciate interpersonal relationships - including a respect for differences among people, ideas and values.

And you will not get any of that from this little machine (points to phone). You will get it from the talented, dedicated faculty and staff who have joined us here today and who you will get to know over the next few years.

Now if you are thinking, “Crap. I'm not sure I can do this,” I’ll put it frankly - that is B.S. You are here because we know that you can be successful in each and every one of your semesters. You’ve got the right stuff, but we are also here to help you be successful.

Many decades ago, when I sat where you are the person talking said "Look to your right and your left. Only one of you will make it through college." Yikes, right? Well, that mindset is dead here at SUNY Oneonta, we know you can be, and we want all of you to be successful.

So please take out your phones, yes take them out, and take a selfie with everyone around you, do as wide an angle as you can, I will do the same up here.

Keep this picture. I want it to be a reminder that not only will one of you or two of you will be successful, but all of you in this picture can be successful. Everyone will experience successes in their own way. We are here to help you and you are here to help each other over the next few years as you approach commencement.

Regarding commencement – it may seem as if it is a long time away, but in my 30 years in education I have not heard any student on graduation day say, “Boy that took forever.” Instead, they are shocked at how fast it went by, and then years later they realize how important their time at college was.

Thank you and I am thrilled you chose to join us here at SUNY Oneonta. I can’t wait to see all that you accomplish.

Welcome back, Red Dragons!

I hope you had an energizing summer, and I am excited to welcome you to the 2023 - 2024 academic year at SUNY Oneonta. I know the weekend will be busy as you all finish preparing for classes and setting up your living spaces. If I haven't been able to say hello in person yet, I look forward to seeing you at the free Opening Picnic lunch outside of Milne Library on Monday, Aug. 28.

The SUNY Oneonta community provides many opportunities to explore your different interests. To make the most of your experience, remember to browse the 100+ clubs and organizations, go to athletic games and competitions, attend theatre performances and check out all the events open to students. Later in the semester, we will welcome Clint Smith, author of our 2023 Common Read "How the Word is Passed," for the Mills Distinguished Lecture on Oct. 23. Free copies of the book will be available for you to pick up during Red Day, Friday, Sept. 1, on the quad.

I know the recent decisions by the Supreme Court regarding Affirmative Action, student loan debt and other important issues may raise some questions about what life at colleges and universities in the U.S. will look like in the future. I want to assure you that, now more than ever, SUNY Oneonta remains dedicated to providing affordable, equitable access to our transformative educational opportunities. With inclusivity as one of our three core values, we know that diversity is among the many critical factors in sustaining a community that produces the well-rounded, accomplished scholars that our region, state and nation need. As a public regional university, we will continue cultivating relationships and pathways to ensure promising students from all backgrounds are able to join and enrich our community.

Our commitments to you as our students will be front and center this year as the university community will be working together to develop our next strategic plan. This plan will provide goals and desired outcomes to guide the university's actions over the next 10 years. We will also work to ensure our strategies for supporting students, faculty, staff, the university community and the local region remain up to date and able to adjust to changes we may see in higher education.

I want each of you to know that I believe you belong here at SUNY Oneonta. It doesn't matter if you are just beginning your journey or returning, I know that you will have a transformational experience here as long as you take advantage of the opportunities to learn and get involved. I am thrilled for classes to begin and hope to see all of you around campus soon.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

The first week of classes is upon us, and I am thrilled to welcome you all to the 2023 - 2024 academic year. I hope you found time over the summer to enjoy activities that relax or reenergize you and spend time with people you care about. I also hope you are excited for classes, programs and events to begin again here at the university. One of the things I am most proud of at SUNY Oneonta is the willingness I see from faculty, staff and students to connect with others, work together and participate in activities as a community.

In fact, the sense of community at SUNY Oneonta was something many students and families pointed out to me during Commencement last spring and Orientation this summer. Excellent teamwork was on full display during the Day One Orientation program over the summer and now during move-in. This was especially the case with the rapid move into Alumni Hall, which included planning, preparation, coordination and work by Facilities Planning, Maintenance and Operations, the Lockshop, Custodial, the Bull Gang and ITS Networking, Telecommunications and Customer Support. These are just a few examples of the excellent efforts to collaborate and create an atmosphere of openness, comfort, and friendliness. It doesn't go unnoticed and is very much appreciated.

We will begin this year having hit many important milestones in improving enrollment and retention for our university community. We are bringing in nearly 1,800 new students (first-year, transfer and graduate). This includes 120 EOP students, our largest class of new EOP students ever. First- to second-year retention won't be finalized until October but is projected to be 79.8%, a significant improvement from the past two years and above the national average of 67% for public institutions. We improved persistence among students in need of extra support through the work of those involved in the Academic Success Program. It is clear the students are excited to be here. You can read the opening message I shared with them online. Each and every one of us plays an essential role in providing the outstanding academic and co-curricular experience we are known for, and I thank you for your efforts.

I ask that we continue fostering our strong sense of community and support one another as we build on these successes and work collectively on developing our next strategic plan throughout this year. Collaboration and creativity will be key as we plan for the future and to ensure we remain an excellent choice for generations of students to come. In that regard, there will be many occasions for us to work, learn and socialize together, like during the campus dialogues, teach-ins, mingles, campus picnic, employee breakfast, Alumni Hall ribbon cutting, Mills Distinguished Lecture, and programs offered by departments, offices and clubs. I look forward to seeing you all at some or all of these events.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

​​​​​​Middle States Commission Reaffirms SUNY Oneonta’s Accreditation

Dear Colleagues,

Last week the Middle States reaccreditation process begun nearly three years ago came to a happy end: The Middle States Commission of Higher Education (MSCHE) reaffirmed SUNY Oneonta’s institutional accreditation “with no follow-up reporting” required.

Perhaps best of all, the process achieved MSCHE’s goal for campuses undertaking reaccreditation: It engendered campus-wide review of—and conversation about—our collective achievement and pointed to areas most in need of improvement. The thorough Site Team evaluation performed in April, in fact, drew many of the same conclusions our Self Study did: We have achievement gaps among student subpopulations that have widened in the past five years that we need to direct resources and attention toward. (We are well-positioned to make progress in closing these equity gaps, aided by an Equity Gap Analysis recently completed by our Office of Institutional Research.) Improvements are also needed in our planning and assessment efforts to ensure that our planning is integrated and cascaded throughout the institution and our assessments are sufficiently outcomes-based so that the results are easily shared and usable.

For those interested in reading the specific suggestions and recommendations made by the Site Team Evaluators and/or our Institutional Response to the team’s findings, please consult our Middle States webpage.

Reaccreditation could not have happened without the effort of many faculty members, staff, administrators, and students working together, diligently and thoughtfully, to evaluate the institution’s progress in the past ten years. Thanks again to all of those who contributed to this vital service to our institution. As we prepare to respond to the findings of this reaccreditation effort, please remember it is never too early to think about the role you might play in six years as we begin to organize our next team to shoulder the next round of reaccreditation work!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President
Eileen Morgan-Zayachek, Senior Associate Provost, AVP for Academic Affairs & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Theresa Russo, Special Assistant to the Provost & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Andrew Kahl, Professor, Theatre Department & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair

At SUNY Oneonta, we work to sustain a welcoming community for everyone throughout the year. During Pride Month, we make a special call for all Red Dragons to reinforce and emphasize our commitment to advocacy, respect and support while also combating bigotry and hate in our world.

SUNY is also celebrating Pride with the theme of "A Place for Pride" this year. SUNY's statement on Pride speaks to our university's values of inclusivity and service. SUNY Oneonta's own Emily Stewart is featured on the SUNY Pride Through the Years timeline and discusses the history of our Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, the first of its kind in SUNY. SUNY will be participating in PrideFest in New York City on Sunday, June 25. Members of the SUNY community are encouraged to join and can register online. The Otsego Pride Alliance also has a list of local events happening in our region.

Together we can ensure SUNY Oneonta remains a distinguished example of a place where everyone feels comfortable and safe to be their most authentic selves.

Sincerely,

Bernadette Tiapo, Chief Diversity Officer and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Alberto Cardelle, President

Dear SUNY Oneonta Community,

Let's use this Juneteenth to reflect on how we can work together to end the inequities facing our society today. As we honor and celebrate the significance of this holiday, let's ask ourselves how we can each do our part to ensure our country learns from the past and strives to make our future more just and supportive for all.

The 2023 Juneteenth celebration in Oneonta will be held on Saturday, June 17, in Neahwa Park. It will highlight Black-owned or Black-run businesses local to our community and promises to be a wonderful event!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

We've reached the end of the 2022-2023 academic year, and I thank you for all you did to make it a success. With finals wrapping up and Commencement on Saturday, there is much to applaud.

This year, we completed a lengthy and demanding reaccreditation self-study and had a successful visit with a team from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. We attained university status. Generous donors gave more than $1 million in gifts, grants and pledges to endow our Student Emergency Fund, and we are on track to finalize the most successful fundraising campaign in our history. We commemorated the 30th anniversary of The Black List and celebrated ways the institution has been, and will continue, making changes and strides forward. Chancellor King visited campus and learned about the great things happening at Oneonta and what students are looking for. The Regional Innovation Council formally launched, and we have established partnerships with local school districts and businesses. We've made significant progress toward the opportunities identified in Regaining Momentum: An Agenda for SUNY Oneonta. We became the new host to SUNY COIL and New York State History Day. The institution was recognized for our achievements and commitments, like being invited to join the Aspen Institute's American Talent Initiative and being awarded a silver sustainability rating by the Association for Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. Our students participated, won or placed in competitions in several states and countries and were even featured on national television. These are just a fraction of the many events and projects accomplished by the talented members of the SUNY Oneonta community. I strongly encourage you to take a moment to and scroll back through all of the stories featured on our News & Events page and in Notes from Netzer throughout the past year. I hope they give you the same sense of admiration and pride that they do for me.

As always, the growing pressures on higher education mean we need to continue working to strengthen SUNY Oneonta.

The outlook for Fall 2023 enrollment remains positive. Our Admissions team reviewed almost 15,000 applications. We are up by more than 25% in deposits for first-year students and more than 50% for transfer students. We anticipate approximately 1,525 new undergraduate students will be joining us in August. Deposits for graduate students are also up nearly 50% for Summer 2023 and 40% for Fall 2023, year over year.

While there is much to make us feel confident, we have developed a new student enrollment plan to strengthen and shape undergraduate enrollment and expand graduate enrollment. You can view our 2023-2025 New Student Enrollment Plan online, which outlines the scope of the plan, data, demographic trends and considerations, competition and goals.

We are also focusing on improving our first to second-year retention rate and analyzing equity gaps among various groups within our student body. To help with this, we will be establishing the University Retention Council. This is a result of the excellent work done by members of the Retention Persistence Completion Committee, Enrollment Management Team and Student Success Leadership Group, which led us to form this new council.

As I've mentioned in several recent meetings, we will begin developing a new strategic plan in the fall. Regaining Momentum will lead us through December 2023, but a more comprehensive strategic plan is necessary. The emerging challenges within higher education and the Middle States team's response to their site visit will guide us during this process. To develop a new strategic plan, we will take an integrated planning approach conducted by the University Budget Committee and the new University Strategic Planning Committee. Together, these groups form the University Integrated Planning Council. Details on the University Integrated Planning Council and the conceptual planning model for our next strategic plan are outlined online.

There is much to look forward to for the 2023-2024 academic year. Again, thank you for your hard work. Congratulations on all you achieved and that which we accomplished collectively this year. I also thank you in advance for participating in institution-wide, divisional, departmental and individual initiatives that will continue supporting our commitment to nurturing a community where students grow intellectually, thrive socially and live purposefully.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Eight Faculty & Staff Recognized by SUNY for Excellence

I am proud to announce that the SUNY Board of Trustees and the Chancellor have recognized seven members of our faculty and staff with Chancellor's Awards for Excellence and one faculty member with a Distinguished Rank this year.

Dr. George Hovis, Professor of English, has been conferred with a Distinguished Teaching Professorship. This is SUNY's highest academic rank and recognizes outstanding teaching competence and mastery consistently demonstrated over many years at SUNY Oneonta. Dr. Hovis has been a member of the faculty in our English department since 2006, has served on numerous committees, advised student organizations and been a sponsor for the Student Grant Program for Research and Creative Activity for several years. In 2017 he was awarded the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching. Read more about Dr. Hovis and his accomplishments.

Phil Bidwell, Lynda Craft, Mark English, Dr. Maria Cristina Montoya, Dr. Marius Munteanu, Dr. Mine Ozer and Sarah Rhodes have been named among the 2023 SUNY Chancellor's Awards for Excellence honorees.

Please join me in congratulating these leaders. Learn more about them and their accomplishments.

George, Phil, Lynda, Mark, Maria Cristina, Marius, Mine and Sarah are most deserving of this distinction. They will be recognized during commencement exercises on Saturday, May 20. These recognitions acknowledge their superior achievement in their disciplines and service to the institution, and I am honored to have them as a part of our university community.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

2023 SUNY Chancellor's Award for Student Excellence Winners & Honorary Degree Recipient

Three members of the senior class have been named 2023 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence recipients: Jamie Crique, Melissa Rose Garrecht, and Robert Lang.

These exceptional student-leaders and scholars with outstanding achievements have served as role models for their peers here at SUNY Oneonta. As three of only 193 students from across the SUNY system who received the award this year, they were honored at a ceremony in Albany yesterday. Read more about Jamie, Melissa Rose, and Robert and their accomplishments.

I am also pleased to announce that we will award an Honorary Doctor of Science Degree to Dr. Mitchell Olman during commencement next month. Dr. Olman graduated from SUNY Oneonta in 1978 with a bachelor's degree in Chemistry. He went on to earn a master's degree in Anatomy from Columbia University and an M.D. from the New York University School of Medicine.

After beginning his career in internal medicine at the University of Chicago Hospitals and Clinics, he became a research fellow in their Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care. He then held a pulmonary medicine subspecialty fellowship at the University of California at San Diego and became a visiting investigator at the prestigious nonprofit biomedical research organization, the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. From 1993 - 2009, Dr. Olman worked at the University of Alabama at Birmingham as a member of the faculty and senior scientist in several research centers and attained the rank of Full Professor of Pathology and Medicine. In 2009, he joined the renowned Cleveland Clinic as a physician-scientist. Today, he leads a pulmonology laboratory in the Department of Inflammation and Immunity at the Cleveland Clinic's Lerner Research Institute. Dr. Olman's and The Mitchell Olman Laboratory's work focuses mainly on pathogenesis and treatment for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension. Among his many other accomplishments, Dr. Olman has served as a primary or co-investigator on grants supported by the National Institutes of Health, has co-authored publications in several prominent scientific journals, and is a member of the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation Peer Review Committee.

Dr. Olman remains very connected to the university. He returned to campus to give the Student Research and Creative Activity Day keynote address in 2011 and was recognized as an Alumni of Distinction by the SUNY Oneonta Alumni Association in 2014. He also established the Dr. Mitchell Olman and Dr. Candace Gladson Scholarship in honor of Professor Bruce Knauer for students who major in Chemistry and have financial need.

Dr. Olman will receive his honorary degree and give the commencement address at the commencement ceremonies on Saturday, May 20. We will also recognize Jamie, Melissa Rose and Robert during the ceremonies. Please join me in congratulating all four Red Dragons on these well-deserved honors.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

The site visit from the Middle States team has concluded, and we would like to extend a university-wide thank you to all who prepared for and participated in this effort. The reaccreditation process, though long and demanding, is essential for our continued success in supporting students and helping SUNY Oneonta remain a great place to learn, live and work.

As noted in the site visit team's report this morning, there are many things to celebrate at SUNY Oneonta. We look forward to the Commission's official accreditation decision this summer.

Contributions to the reaccreditation efforts came from all corners of campus: from people who shared their facilities; provided IT and web support; worked on the weekends to facilitate the visit; provided transportation; served meals; served on the working groups; read and revised self-study drafts; provided evidence; rallied students and colleagues; attended meetings; or provided moral support. This process was truly a community effort.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, President
Eileen Morgan-Zayachek, Senior Associate Provost, AVP for Academic Affairs & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Theresa Russo, Assistant VP for Academic Affairs & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair
Andrew Kahl, Professor, Theatre Department & Middle States Reaccreditation Steering Committee Co-Chair

Dear Red Dragons,

Welcome to the Spring 2023 semester! I hope that you are looking forward to classes beginning on Wednesday and were able to enjoy restful and relaxing moments over the past several weeks. There is much to look forward to this spring.

SUNY Oneonta's designation as a university instead of a college officially begins today! I hope you will attend the celebration of this momentous occasion this Wednesday, Jan. 25, at 3 p.m. in the International Lounge of the Hunt Union.

More than 190 new students are joining the Red Dragon family this semester. Welcome! Additionally, students looking to enroll for Fall 2023 will be on campus throughout the spring for visits. I am sure they will be impressed by the enthusiasm and accomplishments of our welcoming and talented community. Please watch for information from the Office of Admissions regarding admitted student events and opportunities where the university community may be able to assist.

SUNY's new chancellor, John B. King, Jr., began at the beginning of this month. He has embarked on a tour to visit all 64 SUNY campuses this spring. We do not yet have information on when he plans to visit Oneonta, but the details will be shared when they become available.

When sharing the many great things happening at SUNY Oneonta with alumni and friends of the university, I am met with enthusiasm and excitement. I am always inspired by the work you are doing in the classroom, in meetings, in offices, in artistic venues, on athletic fields, in groups and in our local community. I encourage you to stay informed and capitalize on opportunities to get involved and strengthen our community. Please continue to take good care of yourselves and your fellow Red Dragons. I look forward to continuing to support your work and activities and seeing all that is achieved.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

Dear Colleagues,

Welcome to the Spring 2023 semester! I hope you are looking forward to classes beginning on Wednesday and were able to enjoy restful and relaxing moments over the past several weeks. There is much to look forward to this spring.

SUNY Oneonta's designation as a university instead of a college officially begins today! I hope you will attend the celebration of this momentous occasion this Wednesday, Jan. 25, at 3 p.m. in the International Lounge of the Hunt Union.

More than 190 new students are joining the Red Dragon family this semester. Additionally, students looking to enroll for Fall 2023 will be on campus throughout the spring for visits. I am sure they will be impressed by the enthusiasm and accomplishments of our welcoming and talented community. Please watch for information from the Office of Admissions regarding admitted student events and opportunities where the university community may be able to assist.

SUNY's new chancellor, John B. King, Jr., began at the beginning of this month. He has embarked on a tour to visit all 64 SUNY campuses this spring. We do not yet have information on when he plans to visit Oneonta, but the details will be shared when they become available.

We are in the final stages of our re-accreditation with the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, a process of self-study and peer review to examine our institution, help us demonstrate accomplishments, highlight areas of excellence and identify opportunities to better serve students. An advanced draft of the self-study will be posted tomorrow on the university's self-study webpage. We have three weeks until we submit this self-study to the evaluation team that will conduct a site visit in April. The result of their three days on campus will be a report on their perception of our institution's progress and work toward meeting the seven standards set forth by Middle States. Details about the site visit will be shared as the date approaches. Please share any questions or feedback about the self-study by emailing msche@oneonta.edu.

Lastly, I look forward to seeing the creative and productive ways the university community makes use of the new common meeting time (3 - 4 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays). Continue to monitor the Oneonta Bulletin and CampusConnection for information about events, both during the common meeting time and otherwise. The common meeting time is just one example of the progress being made toward the opportunities listed within the Regaining Momentum agenda. Many additional efforts are underway in departments, schools, divisions, clubs and committees across campus. A more complete update on initiatives related to the agenda, funded projects and more will be shared later this semester.

When sharing the many great things happening at SUNY Oneonta with alumni and friends of the university, I am met with enthusiasm and excitement. I am always inspired by the work you are doing in the classroom, in meetings, in offices, in artistic venues, on athletic fields, in groups, in our local community and all across the region. I encourage you to stay informed and capitalize on opportunities to get involved and strengthen our community. Please continue to take good care of yourselves and one another. I look forward to continuing to support your work and activities and seeing all that is achieved.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​

During this season, we hope you are able to reflect on all that you have

accomplished throughout the year and enjoy time with those you love.

Happy New Year from SUNY Oneonta!

Following the approval of Interim SUNY Chancellor Deborah Stanley and the SUNY Board of Trustees, SUNY Oneonta will be designated as a university instead of a college beginning Jan. 23, 2023!

In Jan. 2022, the New York State Board of Regents changed its regulations related to the number of graduate-level degrees an institution must offer to qualify as a university. Because we offer a range of registered undergraduate and graduate programs in the liberal arts and sciences, including at least three master's degrees in the disciplines of agriculture, biological sciences, business, education, engineering, fine arts, health professions, humanities, physical sciences or social sciences, we now can be classified as a university.

You may be wondering, "What does this mean and what is changing?" In short, only our name will change. Instead of "State University of New York College at Oneonta", our official name on record will be "State University of New York at Oneonta." Our moniker and branding will still be "SUNY Oneonta," and the type logo used on the web, publications and signage will not change.

This is a significant moment in our history. Designation as a university will strengthen the future of our institution and boost prospects for enrollment, especially among international and graduate students. It showcases our commitment to progress and more accurately reflects the structure and rigor of our distinguished academic offerings. While our mission and commitment to academic excellence and a student-centered teaching and learning environment remain unchanged, this designation sets us up for exciting opportunities like further development of online graduate degrees and creation of new partnerships and continuing education programs to serve our local community and regional workforce.

All students and employees are invited to gather for a reception to commemorate this new designation on the first day of Spring 2023 classes. Please mark your calendar for cake and refreshments on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2023, at 3 p.m. in the International Lounge in Hunt Union. I look forward to seeing you there and celebrating this new chapter for SUNY Oneonta.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear SUNY Oneonta Community,

Veterans Day presents a time for us to recognize the sacrifices of those who have served our country in the armed forces. Let's reflect on the dedication and selflessness of all who have served, and express special gratitude for the members of our college community, employees, students, alumni and friends who are current or retired military personnel. Their leadership and experiences enrich our college and their dedication to our country is honorable. In addition, we recognize many members of the extended Red Dragon family like parents, grandparents, friends and other relatives who have served. We should be forever grateful for their selfless sacrifice and courage.

I encourage you to participate in the events planned to honor our veterans tomorrow, Nov. 11. You can stop by the Hunt College Union from 11 a.m. - 1 p.m. to fill out a thank you card to be sent to veterans. At 3 p.m., all veterans in our college community and those who wish to thank them are invited to attend a reception at the Craven Lounge in the Morris Conference Center. It is also worth noting that the City of Oneonta is a Green Light for Military Service City and is encouraging community members to display a green light in windows to honor our current service members and veterans through Nov. 13.

We are proud of veterans for their service to our country and their belief in and willingness to protect our democracy.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Presented Oct. 14, 2022, to an assembly of college and university delegates, elected officials, students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members

Good Afternoon!
¡Buenas Tardes!

I would like to recognize our distinguished guests today: Chancellor Deborah Stanley, Trustee Eunice Lewin, Senator Peter Oberacker, Assemblyman Brian Miller, Mayor Mark Drnek, chairperson Patrick Brown, delegates, alumni, students, fellow administrators, faculty, staff, honored guests, my wife Dr. Rachel Frick Cardelle, and friends. All of you here are sharing a very special gift, that is the gift of your time, your presence, and your support. So, I am at a loss for words to express my gratitude to each of you here today. I can only think to say, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

It is more than a privilege to stand before all of you and share in this moment of history for SUNY Oneonta. Since the day I arrived 13 months ago, I have been honored to be part of this remarkable community.

I have been on a college or university campus as a student, researcher, faculty, Chair, Dean, Provost and now President for more than 30 years.

The last 23 years, I have been exclusively at regional public comprehensive universities. These years are filled, for the most part, with stories and memories about instances of success, some of failure but most importantly, those of the remarkable collective work I’ve experienced and accomplished with colleagues and students alike.

But along with those very energizing recollections, there are also memories of the times that that I fell short of espousing the mission of the great institutions at which I worked and the mission of public higher education, namely equitable access.

There was:

• The graduate student that I considered leaving off a grant because they had not completed an analysis on time;
• The meeting I cancelled with a student mentee because he had not shown up for two previous meetings;
• The student that I assigned to a lower quality internship because we did not believe they could perform and would embarrass the program; and
• The community-based organization I did not agree to work with because of rumors of poor financial management.

In each of these times I did exactly the opposite of what Gregory Boyle, a missionary working with gang members in the inner city of L.A., says are a sign of healthy community.

Instead of standing in awe of those in unfortunate circumstances and what they must carry, I judged them and how they carried it.

• In the first case I did not stand in awe of how the graduate student was both managing their schoolwork and trying to decide what to do about an unexpected pregnancy;
• With my mentee, I did not ask about their family life, because if had I, I would have learned that they are an orphan and the family they were living with was moving out of state and he was not sure what he was going to do;
• With the third student, I should have been in awe of his resiliency in reaching the point of completing an internship despite his learning disabilities caused by fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, and;
• Finally, I should have been in admiration of what that small community-based organization was doing to help the population of indigenous people in a predominantly white community which did not understand its customs.

At the core of my actions there was a lack of caring, but the actual root of the problem was a lack of curiosity, awareness and attentiveness. I had fallen into my academic silo and, unlike prairie dogs that at least peak out of their burrows every so often, made decisions in the darkness and confines of that silo. I was not aware of the challenges faced by the communities from which our students come from or where our institutions are housed.

Yes, these were individual shortcomings, but they happened within a system whose reward systems are not always in line with the missions that they profess.

As faculty and staff at a college or university, we are rewarded and celebrated for personal accomplishments, our teaching, our advising, our student services, where we get published, how are recognized by professional organizations, etc. etc.

We have created a system in which it is easier to get noticed through insular and parochial pathways, and disciplinary and professional purity than because of collective action.

In this chronic hardening of the silos, we easily lack the attention required for, and the curiosity about, the broad comprehensive actions and perspectives that are more likely to positively impact the communities where we are located, and therefore improving the structures that influence our students.

This institution has the history, the assets and most importantly, has adopted a mission to overcome these problems. We must find ways to make our stated mission which reads, “We nurture a community where students grow intellectually, thrive socially and live purposefully,” a reality.

A mission that is relevant to all.

We want an institution that will be as relevant 150 years from now as it was 133 years ago when it was founded.

However, institutions cannot simply will their relevance into existence. To be relevant, institutions must engage with the challenges. To be relevant, we must propose solutions. In short, institutions must get dirty in the messy world and jump into the trenches of our social, economic, scientific, and moral debates. We must be critical collaborators in improving the human condition.

As former SUNY chancellor Ernest Boyer argued, “We need to shape our institution from the outside in and surpass the boundaries between the academy and the world.”

For this goal of becoming relevant to happen there are three intertwined areas of work.

• First, our campuses must be a vehicle of social and economic mobility for all students.
  • We must not only open our doors to all students, we must give them a relentless welcome so that they feel supported and secure and can attain their aspirations right here at SUNY Oneonta. We must provide our students with the opportunity to establish a rich web of relationships through instruction, advisement and mentorship so that they learn, grow and thrive from not only books and lectures, but through conversations and discussions, with not only instructors and advisors but with people who can be life-long mentors.
  • However, we must also ensure that these students are reflective of the communities we are supposed to serve, our student body must resemble the diversity of the state. So too, is it necessary for our faculty and staff members to be diverse. Students must be able to see themselves among those they work with and learn from.
  • To state it simply, our institutions must be beacons of representation.
• Second, we need to respond to the needs of our communities and region by offering the relevant research and creative endeavors that our communities demand. We must champion publicly-engaged scholarship. Higher education’s goal of advancing knowledge nationally or globally cannot leapfrog our local needs. If we are not advancing knowledge for the benefit of the communities in which we reside, who will?
• Third, we need to be premier stewards of place. We must cultivate more than sustained partnerships with our communities, our relationships must be in a “symbiotic collusion” - that in which the host region’s future and the future of the institution are inextricably linked. SUNY Oneonta should strive not only to be in Oneonta but to be of Oneonta. We must not only be in Otsego County we must be of Otsego County.

Interestingly, this vision is really nothing new - it is a case of going back to the future, let me explain.

In 1887 as SUNY Oneonta was being established as the Oneonta Normal School, the local newspaper wrote,

“The establishment of this school in Oneonta is an event of supreme importance in the history of this community and of this locality. It means advantages not to be estimated, not merely to those who now are, but to those who should follow; not merely to those who will be within the circle of its immediate influence, but to those unnumbered who are destined indirectly to feel its impulse.”

This 135-year-old expression of hope and prediction for the impact of this institution is our continued purpose — to be relevant to those here and beyond.

We have an opportunity to understand, heal, and strengthen our communities. You here as educators, students, and citizens, and you all have the opportunity to pull away from our sometimes deficit-minded present and be part of an optimistic future.

I ask us to reflect on the generations that came before us in times of in times of war, in times of disease, in times of economic hardship and in times of civil unrest, and realize that there is strong evidence that this optimistic future is not a Sisyphean task, but an attainable aspiration that this institution has been conquering for more than a century.

And if you are asking yourself, "What is it that I can do?"

I want to leave you with a quote from one of my favorite Latinx authors, Sandra Cisneros.

“Cuanto mayor me hago, más consciente soy de las formas en que cosas muy pequeñas pueden hacer un cambio en el mundo. Pequeñas cosas, pero el mundo está hecho de pequeñas cosas, ¿no es así?"
“The older I get the more I am conscious of ways very small things can make a change in the world. Tiny little things, but the world is made of tiny matters, is it not?”

As a real manifestation of this belief, before concluding I would like to announce that, as a result of the commitment of over 9,000 donors who have contributed to our Grow.Thrive.Live The Future of Oneonta fundraising campaign, we have now endowed our Student Emergency Fund with more than one million dollars so that we can assist students experiencing an emergency who require assistance to offset temporary financial difficulty and be relevant in their lives.

Thank you very much.

View Inauguration Ceremony Recording

Welcome back. hope you had a great summer. I am thrilled we are able to be back together and hosting this breakfast again. We are starting this year in a stronger position because of the excellent work over the last year and this summer.

We are only five days into the academic year and already we’ve had:

• An army of volunteers making the experience of moving in for every student special and fun.
• 1400 students come together with faculty and staff to celebrate the beginning of their academic journey here at SUNY Oneonta.
• Students with their laptops studying in nooks across campus. This is because of IT’s hard work upgrading WiFi access.
• Students who are recounting the amazing experience they had in a camping trip one week before classes started through the GEOFYRST program.
• New students who’ve already made good friends because of the summer AEOP program.
• Employees saying hello to returning students as if they were family.
• Academic Advisement, the Registrar’s Office and Financial Aid were out under the tent helping students in a friendly environment.
• A more hospitable temperature in IRC because of the work of facilities
• Faculty meeting outside talking about general education curricula.

These are just a few examples of what has happened over the past few days.

I understand that many times it is easy to find yourself working on projects by yourself or with a small group of your peers and wondering if it makes a difference. Believe me it does.

Last week, I walked by Student Accounts and overhead staff working with a family and explaining their aid package and what to expect. They were patient as the family expressed some confusion about the process. Later on, I heard the same family downstairs in Netzer commenting on how much better they felt after speaking to the staff person.

The truth is that many of you may never encounter all of the students that you help because you are not there when they come into a clean classroom, are working WiFi, are processing something in their file behind the scenes, etc. Or, you may see them only once as you help them with a question or pass them in the hallway. What you don’t see is how that encounter played an impact on whether they could stay in school, or whether they felt at home and decided to stick it out after a tough day.

Last year I used the analogy of a puzzle - that we were all like puzzle pieces that, when put together, make up the full picture of this institution. I think a better analogy is one with bricks. We are all individual bricks that, if not part of bigger enterprise, are just pieces sitting in a pile. But, put together, we provide a base - a steppingstone for a whole generation of students to have the opportunity to dream and accomplish things they would not otherwise.

I told the students at convocation that they were following the path that students who have come to this institution for the last 133 years. Those students had been here in times of war, in times of disease, in times of economic hardship, and in times of civil unrest. The same is true for all of them.

We are building on what four to five generations of professionals have done. You are not just processing a file or a check, you are making sure that this institution remains vibrant and effective for another 133 years and for another four to five generations of students. You are playing a critical role in creating opportunities our students may not have otherwise.

And, most Importantly, providing our students with a relentless welcome. So, I ask that we use this vision as we continue with our work this year.

We will soon be announcing the next round of funding for projects related to the strategic opportunities and Regaining Momentum Agenda. We have already had one dialogue session this year, and it is my goal to have one per month. Keep an eye on the bulletin for announcements about each, and please join to be a part of the conversation. We have also submitted the letter to the SUNY Board of Trustees requesting designation as a university and should hear back soon.

There are many events and activities planned for this year and I encourage you to take advantage of all that is happening. It invigorating to attend so many social events and activities. There will be several events surrounding the commemoration of the 30th anniversary of the Black List, the Common Read and Mills Distinguished Lecture with George Takei, other well-known speakers and many community building events.

And by the way, because of your hard work we have been ranked in the top 200 by money magazine and top 500 in the country (out of 4000) by Forbes.

Lastly, we haven't had a breakfast since 2019, and it has been traditional to recognize employees who are new or in new roles, so I would like to ask everyone who has joined the college since August 2019 to stand, and anyone who is in a new position or received a promotion since Aug. 2019 to stand and be recognized.

The work that each and every one of you do makes a difference in the life of our institution and therefore the lives of our students and your co-workers. Thank you for your effort and dedication. And I also want to let you know how very happy I am that I am here, and I am proud to be working alongside all of you to continue to make SUNY Oneonta a place founded in honor and good faith.

Thank you.

Dear students,

It gives me a wonderful feeling that I have the privilege of welcoming students to another academic year at SUNY Oneonta. I am very excited for this year, my first full academic year as a Red Dragon.

The college is ready for move-in and for classes to begin. It is going to be an active and invigorating year, as evidenced by the number of events and activities happening during the first few weeks of classes. Later this semester, we will have events where all members of the college community can engage in activities and discussions regarding our Common Read book, "They Called Us Enemy" by George Takei. Please mark your calendars to hear this renowned actor, author and activist talk about his life and the book as he delivers the Mills Distinguished Lecture on Oct. 24. We will also welcome award-winning journalist, Nikole Hannah-Jones on Nov. 3, when she will speak about the 1619 project in commemoration of the occurrence of the Black List. Additional information about these events will be shared as the dates get closer.

As everyone returns to school and our routines, I want to remind you of the special opportunity you have as part of an academic community. This means being part of a community that engages in discussions about many different topics and issues and, most importantly, engages with the world around us. This summer has certainly provided issues with which to engage. Recent Supreme Court decisions have altered the role of government and impacted our college, region, nation, and world. The dramatic shift in the governance of abortion rights through the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision and the overturning of Roe v. Wade is momentous and calls for institutions of higher education like ours to do what we do best – inform, debate and engage. It is important to remember that here in New York, our laws distinctly outline that residents of our state have the right to comprehensive reproductive healthcare, which includes the right to make choices about their healthcare and future. However, we cannot discount the greater impact this decision will have on public health and our society. Other decisions further strengthen this call to become involved in national deliberations. The Court's decisions on concealed weapons, overturning a century-old New York law, and the Environmental Protection Agency's authority over carbon emissions bring bearing on our college's hard work to provide a safe living and learning environment and core value of sustainability. The importance that all members of our college community engage in constructive conversations, carry out our role and responsibility to be informed and engaged citizens, and participate in elections cannot be understated.

I hope that you enjoyed time with loved ones, favorite activities or special places over the summer. I also hope you are excited to either begin your journey at SUNY Oneonta or reunite with your fellow Red Dragons and reconnect with faculty and staff. I know I am excited for you to be here, and I look forward to seeing you across campus and at the many great events that we have in store.

Have a wonderful start of the semester.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear colleagues,

I hope your summer has provided a season for replenishment and revitalization through time off or time to reconnect with loved ones, favorite activities or special places. We will, very soon, be back in the excitement of a new academic year, so reloading our energy reserves and enthusiasm is critical. As we approach the new academic year and fall semester activities, I want to highlight a few significant items and updates.

Although many outside of higher education may think that after commencement work is done here at the college for a few months, the reality is that we are very busy during the summer. The vice presidents provided me with an extensive list of the work carried out (and still ongoing) this summer. The list is too long to include here, but please know that the work is both recognized and sincerely appreciated - not only by me, but by the students and their families, both new and returning. They will observe and experience that we are prepared to meet expectations, support them and help them achieve their goals.

If you have been on campus, you have likely noticed the work to keep our grounds and buildings in pristine condition thanks to the excellent work of our grounds crew, facilities and maintenance staff. Facilities has also been busy overseeing multiple projects including, but not limited to, a major multiyear site project for ADA accessibility, continued work on the Alumni Hall project, renovations in Hays and Matteson Halls, the installation of a new sign at the West Street campus entrance, the addition of pedestrian crossing safety equipment and, in coordination with OAS/Sodexo, development of a new dining venue, Simple Servings, an allergen-free zone opening this fall in Wilsbach Hall. Academic Affairs has been hard at work block-presetting schedules for the incoming first-year students, refining the division's work on student success, planning for our next general education program, and continuing our Middle States self-study. We saw a return to faculty-led global programs and had over 40 students participate in undergraduate research and creative activities. Information Technology Services has been completing projects to improve our WI-FI network, data security and classroom technology, and reallocating computer lab resources based on trending demands. Colleagues in Student Affairs resurrected our summer orientation program, in which over 700 new students completed the Day One orientation session in July. The reviews for the summer Day One sessions clearly show a deep appreciation of the college-wide welcome. We also welcomed back summer camps, and Athletics was busy with various summer programs. The Division of College Advancement, in collaboration with over 20 other departments and offices, started the summer with a very successful Alumni Weekend in early June. The event brought about 750 alumni and friends back to campus, and their positive observations and sentiments about their experience and everything happening at the college were universal.

We begin this semester seeing progress on several initiatives related to the Regaining Momentum Agenda. We have:

• established a Student Success Leadership Team with the goal of purposefully coordinating our retention efforts;
• begun the first training of the Faculty Academy - a faculty professional development program about inclusive pedagogies;
• expanded the number of experiential learning opportunities - with the highest number of summer undergraduate research participants ever this year;
• raised 90 percent of the funds needed to meet the goal of endowing the Student Emergency Fund;
• held two meetings of the new Regional Innovation Council;
• provided preliminary funding to several projects designed to support student success and community building, both on campus and off;
• and begun the process of adjusting the course schedule so that, beginning in Spring 2023, the college will have a couple of hours when classes are not scheduled and designated as common meeting times. This is a strategic initiative to strengthen the opportunities for us to come together as a community and engage in collective discussions on critical college issues, as well provide additional opportunities for events and activities that celebrate our college community.

As a way to continue building on the momentum from last year’s dialogue sessions, we will aim to have at least one session per month this year.

Several times last semester, I indicated that the New York State Education Department Board of Regents changed the criteria for institutions to qualify for status as a university in the fall of 2021. Under the new criteria, SUNY Oneonta already qualifies to be recognized as a university. There are over 10 private institutions in the state that have already made this change, and all but two of our sister institutions (SUNY regional comprehensive colleges) are requesting university designation. This issue will likely be taken up at the SUNY Board of Trustees meeting in September. Designation as a university will strengthen the future of our institution and we are already operating as one according to the Board of Regents’ guidelines. I will present about our intentions to request university designation from the SUNY Board of Trustees during my report at the Aug. 29 Senate meeting, and then at dialogue and open forum on Aug. 31. I invite all employees to attend either meeting to learn more about what this means and provide feedback. Our moniker and branding would still remain “SUNY Oneonta,” but our official name on record would no longer contain “College at Oneonta.”

I would like to conclude by advising the campus about recent re-organizations and assignments intended to strengthen our operations. The first is the addition of Dia Carleton to the President’s Cabinet where she will provide representation of, and input regarding, personnel matters during discussions. Second is an expanded role for Karen Brown who is now serving as our Senior Enrollment Officer and Executive Director of Admissions and will oversee the Student Success Leadership Team. Lastly, to better represent her everyday work and responsibilities (which will still include internal communications), Karyn Wendrow’s title has been changed to Deputy Chief of Staff and Director of Executive Communication.

SUNY Oneonta is a community that we should all feel proud to be associated with and part of. This does not mean that there is not work to do – there always will be, so that we can continue to realize a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. But it is also a place that, because of everyone’s hard work and commitment, stands in a very strong position to flourish and continue being a source of pride for generations to come.

I look forward to our continued collective work this coming year.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Today, we recognize the significance of Juneteenth in our nation's history and celebrate freedom and equity.

Opal Lee, known as the grandmother of Juneteenth, says that, "Juneteenth means freedom for everybody."

Opal is credited with helping to initiate the movement to make Juneteenth a national holiday. Between Sept. 2016 and Jan. 2017, she walked from Fort Worth, TX to Washington D.C. in a symbolic act calling for Juneteenth to become a national holiday. She walked 2.5 miles at a time, representing the 2.5 years it took Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger to arrive in Texas to inform some of the last enslaved people of the end of the Civil War after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued in Jan. 1863. He arrived in Galveston, TX on June 19, 1865.

Opal was 90 years old when she completed her walk to Washington, and was a special guest at the signing ceremony when the bill to make Juneteenth a federal holiday was signed into law by President Biden last year. She has also been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize and is a driving force behind the planned National Juneteenth Museum in Texas.

Opal's story is a reminder that it is never too late, and no actions are too small, to make a difference. I hope everyone takes time to honor and celebrate this meaningful holiday.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear SUNY Oneonta Community,

Our state experienced a horrendous tragedy yesterday with the loss of ten New Yorkers as a result of a racist act of violence in Buffalo. The SUNY Oneonta community stands in solidarity with everyone who has been affected by the shooting and grieves for the victims and their families. We denounce not only the violence, but the hateful motivation and prejudice that fueled it.

As we support one another through this upsetting time, let us also stand together to condemn the intolerance and brutality displayed by this criminal act and others like it across our nation and the world. Our community’s commitment to valuing diversity, equity and inclusion is a critical antidote to bigotry and extremism.

For anyone who may be experiencing distress and would like support, or those who may simply want to talk through thoughts and feelings surrounding this terrible event, please reach out to the resources available to you at the college. Staff from the Counseling Center are available to talk with students and provide assistance. Faculty and staff can reach out to the Employee Assistance Program for referrals and resources.

Please also remember that the SUNY Oneonta Bias Acts Response Team and University Police are available to respond to incidents within our college community.

Today, I ask for us all to commit to contributing to a community, not only within our college, but also in our town, our region and our society, that fosters justice, kindness and peace.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Five Faculty & Staff Receive SUNY Chancellor's Awards for Excellence

I am proud to announce that five members of our faculty and staff have been named recipients of the 2022 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence. Please join me in congratulating Dr. Simona Giura, Rebecca O'Donnell, Dr. Sarah Portway, Dr. Sasha Ramlal and Dr. William Wilkerson.

These members of our college community are leaders in their disciplines who have excelled in the areas of teaching, scholarship and service to the institution. Read more about them and their accomplishments at the link below.

Learn More About Our Recipients

This is the highest honor for faculty and staff in SUNY, and our recipients will be recognized during commencement exercises on Saturday, May 21. Simona, Rebecca, Sarah, Sasha and William are most deserving of receiving this distinction, and I am proud to call them colleagues.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

As we wrap up the 2021-2022 academic year, I want to extend my best wishes for finals and the end of the semester. We have had a productive year, and I thank you for your contributions in helping it to be a safe and successful one. Have a healthy and energizing summer.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Read Transcript: Spring 2022 End-of-Year Message

May is here and we have just a few days before classes and finals are over and the 2021-2022 academic year is in the books. It is hard for me to believe that I joined the SUNY Oneonta community just eight months ago. My deepest appreciation for being such a welcoming community.

After attending many meetings, competitions, productions and ceremonies, I feel genuinely connected to both the on and off campus community. The opportunity to see first-hand what makes SUNY Oneonta such a wonderful place has been inspiring.

While this is the time of year we often look ahead to plans for the summer and the next year, I encourage you to take a moment to look back on all that we have accomplished this year.

The careful attention to COVID protocol and consideration for your fellow Red Dragons helped us have two successful semesters with in-person instruction, events and activities. I remain very much in awe by both the resilience and the flexibility demonstrated by everyone on campus. It was hard, but it has meant giving our students an experience that had been missing for over a year.

A few of the many bright spots we’ve seen this year include:

• welcoming the class of 2020 back to campus for an in-person graduation celebration, a return to scholarly events like the Mills Distinguished Lecture the Student Research and Creativity Showcase, and co-curricular events such as musical performances, theatre productions, athletic competitions and entertainment events like O-Fest.
• The college also served the region by serving as a community COVID testing site for several months during the winter.
• We saw outstanding collaboration and community mindedness and that helped us through an unexpected power outage this spring.
• We broke a record during the Powered By You giving challenge which generated more than 221 thousand dollars in donations to support students and the college community.
• I’m especially grateful to all who participated in the institutional dialogue sessions that helped form the Regaining Momentum Agenda which will help guide our collective actions over the next 18 months. It was a privilege to hear from everyone and learn more about what makes our college a great place and about the opportunities we have to advance.

It has been a privilege getting to know all of you, and my appreciation goes to every student, staff, and faculty member for your effort and contributions this year. I hope you can fill your summer with activities that energize you and I thank you again for a wonderful year.

Four Students Receive 2022 SUNY Chancellor's Award

I am proud to announce our 2022 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence recipients, Alyssa Carbone, Gabrielle Cecere, Alexa Laska, and Teresa Lopez-Long.

These scholars have excelled academically, been exemplary leaders and dedicated extensive amounts of their time and energy to several organizations, committees and initiatives during their time at SUNY Oneonta. Read more about Alyssa, Gabrielle, Alexa and Teresa and their accomplishments at the link below.

Learn More About Our Recipients

​​​They were four of only 180 students across the SUNY system who received the award this year and were honored at a ceremony in Saratoga Springs today.

Please join me in congratulating Alyssa, Gabrielle, Alexa and Teresa on this well-deserved honor.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear colleagues,

I am pleased to announce the agenda that has resulted from our collective efforts during the dialogue sessions this spring. "Regaining Momentum: An Agenda for SUNY Oneonta" outlines the integrated approach and cross-cutting principles that will steer our actions over the next 18 months as we agree on and accomplish some or all of the strategic opportunities listed within the document.

The full agenda, background information and links to the notes and materials from the dialogue sessions are available on the Regaining Momentum webpage.

Information about applying for funding to support efforts related to the strategic opportunities will be distributed soon. I encourage everyone to think about ways that you and your department can contribute to accomplishing the opportunities and resulting plans or projects. Updates and information will be shared as we proceed through the next year-and-a-half.

Yesterday I gave a brief presentation about the agenda and would like to reiterate my thanks to everyone who dedicated attention and energy to this important process over the past 10 weeks. As the agenda indicates, we are approaching these opportunities from a position of strength, and I am excited about what lies ahead. With collaboration and consistency, endeavors both big and small will have a positive impact, build trust and help keep us moving forward.

Sincerely
Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Over the last week and a half we have watched the Russian government continue with an unrestrained invasion of Ukraine.

As a community, our thoughts are with all who are directly impacted by this act of aggression and all forms of aggression across the world. As an institution of higher education that values and works toward global interconnectedness, we echo these words of the Dalai-Lama: “We need to develop a sense of the oneness of humanity…. this is how we will build a more peaceful world." As a group of educators and learners, we ask all members of our community to engage in conversations with one another about these current events and other conflicts across the world that minimize any person’s humanity.

In order to further our mission of open discussion and debate, an event supported by the divisions of Academic Affairs and Student Affairs will be held on Wednesday evening. All are invited to attend the conversation titled "Making Sense of the Unthinkable: A Roundtable Discussion of the Russian Invasion of Ukraine," on March 9 at 7 p.m. in the atrium of the Physical Science building. The program will feature the expertise of faculty from SUNY Oneonta and Hartwick College and opportunities for all to examine and engage. Special thanks goes to the Political Science department for organizing this important conversation.

Counseling, mental health services and other resources for support in processing all that we are hearing and seeing about the conflict are available to students through the Counseling Center and to employees through the Employee Assistance Program.

There are also many in our community who would like to support those in need due to this crisis. The U.S. State Department has information on its website on how to help.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Dear colleagues,

As we are all busy preparing for the beginning of another semester, I want to welcome you all to Spring 2022. Please watch the video above and review the Planning Dialogue Lib Guide, which houses a copy of the invitation to the upcoming dialogue sessions and corresponding planning documents. I look forward to seeing you throughout the upcoming weeks and months.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Read Transcript: Spring 2022 Welcome and Dialogue Session Reminder

Hello. First of all, I'd like to wish you all a happy New Year. I, as you, hope that this new year brings us continued optimism for the future of our college. I also hope that you were able to enjoy the break in a way that helped you replenish your energies as we begin a new semester.

As you know, our plans are to start classes on Wednesday in an in person format. The current trends in the state's COVID incidents and the re-entry plans that we have instituted, which includes required boosters, testing, and masking - sets us up well to have a successful opening of the semester. It will continue to be all of our responsibility to ensure that we all abide by our guidance and prevention policies so that we can have a safe completion of the spring semester. I look forward to attending the wide array of events planned for the semester starting with the speakers that have been scheduled to commemorate Martin Luther King Day and Black History Month. I look forward to seeing you at these events and others throughout the semester.

As I begin my second semester here, I've invited the campus to a series of campus dialogues to help me set an agenda for the next 18 months. Included in the email that I sent with this video is a link to the electronic site that has the invitation as well as the background information. As I say in the invitation, the college needs a strategic plan. However, we as a campus are not in a position to engage in such a process at this time. So the hope is that through these dialogues, the campus collectively can assist me as well, as the whole campus, in completing a list of the strategic opportunities that can guide the colleges work until we initiate a strategic planning process in about 18 months.

I thank you for your continued commitment to our students and I look forward to seeing you soon at one of the dialogues, or all the dialogues, and at other campus events. Have a wonderful weekend.

Dear colleagues,

Let me first wish you and your families a happy new year.

As we approach the beginning of the spring semester, we are all clearly concerned with the current state of the pandemic. I want to assure you that the COVID Response Team (CRT) continues to regularly monitor the trends in the state as well as guidance emanating from SUNY, the Department of Health and the Governor’s office. Please continue to watch for and review messages from the CRT as we prepare for our in-person start on Jan. 26.

In addition to responding to the challenges posed by the pandemic, it is critical that we continue to prepare the college for the coming years, as higher education faces new and continuing challenges.

I want to invite you to take part in a collective dialogue about strategic opportunities that the college should focus on over the next 18 months. You can review a more in-depth invitation and document that provides additional information about the dialogues and planning process, or you may go directly to the Planning Dialogue Lib Guide, which will give you access to the invitation and all other corresponding documents.

As we begin the new semester, we as a college and as part of the higher education sector will not only face challenges but also, more excitingly, opportunities to strengthen our institution. In a time of national uncertainty, SUNY Oneonta can be a source of continuity, an example of determination and a beacon of optimism.

Let us engage collectively and not merely as a community of individuals. Thank you for your continued commitment to our students.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle, PhD MPH
President

Reflecting on Jan. 6, 2021, One Year Later

As a college, we are a cornerstone of educational opportunity and are committed to educating future generations of our society. This means making sure we partner with, and respond to the needs of, our local communities, and it also signifies a responsibility to strive for a truly open democracy. We will accomplish this by continuing to ensure that our graduates are informed, analytical and engaged members of our cities and towns, states, country and world.

As we mark the one-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection at our nation's Capitol, let us all recommit ourselves to the objectives listed above. This responsibility is not new, and many before us saw the danger of what can happen by not committing to these objectives. In 1947, President Truman's Commission on Higher Education stated that a college education provides "the means to a more abundant personal life and a stronger, freer social order." As an institution of higher education enveloped in the liberal arts, it is particularly important for us to use the events of last year to remind ourselves that the actions we — faculty, staff and students — take are the building blocks of our country’s continuous efforts toward a more perfect democracy.

Today is a day to not only reflect, but also to dedicate ourselves to what we can be: a more inclusive and freer democracy.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

As of today (Nov. 22, 2021), I have been on campus 73 days - a flash of time in comparison to the institutional timelines that govern the life, culture and character of an institution, especially an institution with the rich history of SUNY Oneonta.

During my interviews with the search committee, campus community, SUNY Board of Trustees and the Chancellor’s office, I made it clear that I believed the college stood on strong foundations. Over the last 10 weeks, this has become even more evident to me after completing the following actions:

• ​​​​​reviewing the institution’s historical enrollment data,
• visiting high school counselors across the state,
• having conversations with dozens, yes dozens, of alumni I have been able to encounter,
• hearing stories from students and faculty of how funds from our donors distributed through our foundation have helped them advance their education and careers,
• attending art exhibitions, plays, dance performances, cultural events and athletic competitions,
• sitting in on academic and scholarly lectures,
• interacting with students at the summer research showcase and during the visit with the Chancellor to our Counseling, Health and Wellness Center and Experiential Learning Center,
• holding dialogues with recent retirees,
• listening to faculty and staff during multiple forums and, most importantly,
• listening to students throughout the different meetings and forums held this semester.

I list these not as evidence of me being busy but as tangible indicators of the talent, capacity and commitment generated by all of you.

The pride every student and employee I spoke with has in being a member of the Red Dragon community was unmistakable. Those conversations made it evident that this community understands the value of public education and the transformational role that SUNY Oneonta has the opportunity to play in every student’s future.

I have, throughout my career, had the privilege to be closely involved with three other state systems of higher education, and just last week I was at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities’ Presidents and Chancellors meeting. Using perspectives from these experiences, it is very clear that this institution is in a stronger position in terms of enrollment, finance, academic reputation and student experience than many regional comprehensive colleges across the country.

Therefore, the question to ask ourselves is not, “Does our institution have the assets to address the challenges facing us?” Nor is it, “Do we have to restructure the institution so we can prepare for the future?” It’s a much easier question: “How do we remind ourselves of, refocus our efforts on and recreate what was already here - a strong community of educators working collectively to serve our students and the broader community in the aspiration of a brighter future?”

Of course, there are national and regional challenges ahead of us that will require us to assess some of our practices, some of which include:

• a public that is more skeptical of the benefits of public higher education,
• a decline in the population of high school students, particularly in the northeast,
• incoming students who are more diverse and have taken novel paths to higher education,
• K-12 school systems that perpetuate an opportunity gap among under-represented student groups, and
• for the next several years, incoming classes of first-year students who lost over 18 months of in-classroom instruction during their high school careers.

My style as a higher education administrator has been to approach complex problems such as these through a collective impact approach. The concept of collective impact hinges on the idea that in order for organizations to create lasting solutions to large-scale problems, they must coordinate their efforts and work together around a common agenda using a structured form of collaboration and strong, continuous communication.

I believe our institution is well placed to engage in collective endeavors.

The high-impact opportunities provided to our students through the Experiential Learning Center, the broad range of student development programming we offer, governance bodies such as the College Senate and its committees and, most importantly, our strong academic programs all demonstrate that the college already knows how to collaborate.

In terms of communication, last year a taskforce on internal communication was created which has since become a presidential advisory committee. This group, along with my office, has been actively working to strengthen the institution’s internal communication practices.

Finally, the common agenda. I am aware that the institution does not currently have a strategic plan, which I believe is important in order to form the foundation of a common agenda. However, I am also aware that there is institutional fatigue with the implementation of new initiatives and plans. Therefore, I do not believe it is wise to engage in a strategic planning process at this time. Instead, there are a series of documents and plans in existence that I believe can serve as the foundation for what I would like to call "a process of institutional priority checkup." The idea is to use all the existing plans and documents to collectively identify a set of institutional priorities that can help us align our work for the next 18-24 months until the institution is prepared for a new strategic plan.

Over the next few weeks, before we depart for the winter break, I plan to discuss this idea with the appropriate governance groups, but I do not envision a heavy lift or an overly-structured process or product. Instead, the process could be a continuation of the presidential transition process - the creation of forums and spaces where the different constituent groups, taking the priorities already set out in the existing documents as a starting point, can provide feedback and input to establish a broad set of institutional priorities.

Out of these talks, I hope we can identify areas of focus that build upon three main themes. These themes recur across various existing documents and are key for us in facing and prevailing over the external challenges I previously mentioned.

• First, prioritizing the strengthening of a student-centered teaching and learning environment. As our incoming students not only change demographically, the pre-baccalaureate experiences of all students will have had an 18-month curtailment that will impact their college readiness. We must be prepared with a renewed focus on professional development in teaching and learning, so that we all may serve as effective educators to these students. This development and practice must always be based on a bolstered culture of inquiry, service and scholarship.
• Second, continuing our unwavering commitment to ensuring that institutional goals for diversity, equity and inclusion are integrated into all plans and efforts. On a personal level, I want to make it clear that I am committed to making SUNY Oneonta, and the broader Oneonta community, a place where there is no space for hate, discrimination or bigotry of any kind.
• Third, facilitating an increase in students’ engagement throughout their collegiate experience. This is what Peter Felton of Elon University calls a “relentless welcome” (The Relationship Rich Education, 2020). Felton’s work demonstrates the importance of providing students with a welcoming environment where they can make connections. The literature shows that the greater the number of connections made by a student, the greater the likelihood for the student’s success in terms of retention, progress toward graduation and post-graduation outcomes.

I am looking forward to further conversations that will help us continue to align our work over the next 18 months.

As a way to initiate activity and advance movement around these identified institutional priorities, we will use them to help guide a process for funding strategic initiatives. The funding will be provided for up to three years. Like similar processes previously enacted, this will be guided by the College Budget Committee. Information about the priorities and funding process will be available in the middle of the spring semester.

I understand that many individuals in our community are feeling disconnected and weary, and that there are many factors that contribute to this. Clearly the exercise of returning to in-person work and learning has been taxing, but there are also other challenges. There is the pressure of trying to find a sustainable balance between work and a personal life; growing economic pressures of an increased cost of living coupled with income that is not keeping pace; a constant level of uncertainty related to the path of the pandemic, and finally, changes in the way we teach, work and learn.

As president, I want to work with other college administration leaders, college governance, our bargaining units and the student body to collectively identify solutions. The issues I’ve discussed are structural issues that will not be resolved by just one of us. We must all become enfranchised in finding the solutions. The college leadership has already made commitments to begin this process.

First, we have been approving, and will continue to approve, searches for positions that will help alleviate the growing workload in many areas. Two I want to highlight are the searches for two counselors for our Counseling, Health and Wellness Center, and the searches for 22 faculty positions.

Second, we are proposing the creation of a taskforce in collaboration with the bargaining units that will begin in the spring to evaluate the starting salaries of faculty and staff as well as address issues of salary inversion and compression.

Third, the divisional leaders and I will be assessing our current telecommuting pilot program and identifying ways it may be able to grow and provide a mechanism for greater work flexibility and effective outcomes.

Fourth, the Health and Wellness Committee will be proposing various initiatives to continue to apply a comprehensive level of attention to the wellbeing of our entire campus.

Finally, if our college is going to help counter the growing skepticism of the value and benefits of public higher education, we must strive to be good stewards of place. This means that we must leverage SUNY Oneonta’s values of service, scholarship and sustainability to strengthen ties with our host communities and serve as a vital anchor institution in the continued development of our region. Our external partners will be part of forums in the spring so that we can begin to bring these key external voices into the discussion and discern the areas of coordination, collaboration and integration. SUNY Oneonta should strive not only to be in Oneonta, but to be of Oneonta. The relationship between the institution and the community is, I believe, not merely a partnership, but rather a symbiotic collusion in which the host city’s future and the institution’s future are inextricably linked.

I want to thank you for the time allotted to me and thank you for listening, and I want to conclude by also thanking all of you and the broader community for welcoming my wife, Rachel, and me to Oneonta. We have found ourselves feeling at home very quickly, so much so that just yesterday we added a new member of the college community – Yeobo, a five-month-old puppy.

Thank you, and have a wonderful Thanksgiving and end to the semester.

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Giving Thanks

This week, many of us will take time to enjoy the company of friends and loved ones, and it is also a time to reflect. While managing new routines and overcoming challenges in our studies, work and personal lives, we have persevered toward a successful semester. I thank you for your dedication and hope you can find time to pause and relax.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

Read Transcript: A Thanksgiving Message from President Cardelle

Hello Red Dragons. Before the beginning of the holiday season and before the frenzy and excitement of the end of the semester I want to share with you a few reflections about this past semester.

At a personal level, I want to let you know that I am incredibly thankful to have become a member of the SUNY Oneonta college community -- a group of talented students, engaged faculty, committed staff, and supportive friends. I feel privileged to have found a community committed to the dissemination and creation of knowledge, and to the development of a transformative learning community.

I also want to encourage all of you to consider the impact you as individuals, and our collective efforts, have had on the lives of those who call SUNY Oneonta home. This college, which encompasses the passion, commitment, and efforts of all, returned from a year like no other. While many challenges still lie ahead, this community overcame obstacles and capitalized on the underlying benefits and opportunities that can only be found in an academic community.

I can tell you that I have heard from many students about how grateful they are to be back learning, growing, thriving and living together on campus. I encourage you to think about this gratitude and more importantly about the strength of spirit that achieved it.

You should all be proud of contributing to the well-being of every Red Dragon and I offer you all my warmest wishes for a safe and peaceful Thanksgiving.

Today, SUNY Oneonta is participating in a very special nation-wide event, the annual National First-Generation College Celebration. Members of our college community who are the in the first-generation of their family to earn a bachelor’s degree are being spotlighted on our website and social media all day long. I encourage you to take a moment to read about our first-generation students, faculty, staff and alumni and their hard work, resiliency and incredible achievements.

Meet First-Generation Red Dragons

To support current and prospective first-generation students and families, the college has created a webpage with academic and financial aid information and resources, and short profiles of more than 25 SUNY Oneonta first-generation students, faculty, staff and alumni. I am also pleased to announce the establishment of our own chapter of Alpha Alpha Alpha, the national first-generation honor society. Our first group of honorees will be inducted in the spring. Lastly, you can stop by one of the celebration tables in Hunt Union, Fitzelle Hall, Wilsbach Hall, or the quad today to get a celebration button, refreshments, and information on resources for first-generation students.

My thanks goes to those who organized our celebration as well as the many Red Dragons who shared their stories. Your experiences are inspiring and help to better educate us on what it means to be first-generation, the systemic barriers plaguing higher education, and the supports needed for first-generation students to access, and succeed at, college.

As you know, ensuring equitable access to a quality education is of the utmost importance to me and many others at SUNY Oneonta. I hope you will join us in celebrating our first-generation Red Dragons today.

Sincerely,

​​​​​​

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

​​​​

Dear Red Dragons,

As we approach the October break, I thank you all for your efforts to follow COVID guidelines and help keep the number of cases among our campus community low. These efforts are working, so the COVID Response Team is in the process of reviewing the campus and residence hall visitor policies and will provide details on any updates next week.

If you are planning to travel or gather with others over the break, please use caution and your best judgement. Protect yourself and others by wearing a mask in social situations, and get tested if you feel sick or have been exposed to someone who is positive for COVID.

If you begin to show symptoms over the break, get tested immediately. The Counseling, Health and Wellness Center will be closed over the weekend and on Monday, Oct. 11, but will resume normal operating hours on Tuesday, Oct. 12. You should contact your primary care provider or get tested at a local pharmacy or testing site if you need a test while the Health Center is closed.

Everyone is encouraged to participate in the on-campus surveillance testing upon your return to campus in case you came into contact with COVID and to prevent spread by any asymptomatic spread. The on-campus testing center in Morris Conference Center will have adjusted hours due to the break:

• Sunday, Oct. 10: 4 - 8 p.m.
• Tuesday, Oct. 12: 4 - 8 p.m.
• Wednesday, Oct. 13: 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
• Sunday, Oct. 17: 1 - 8 p.m.

Next week we will be halfway through the semester, and I am confident we will all continue to work together to help our community remain safe and healthy. I hope you enjoy some well-deserved time off!

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President

This Saturday will mark 20 years since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on our nation. Nearly 3,000 lives were lost in the attacks, including seven members of our SUNY Oneonta alumni family. Many of us still remember the shock, grief and sadness of that day. It is hard to believe that two decades have already passed.

As we witnessed tragedy on 9/11, we were also witness to acts of selflessness, cooperation, unity and love. Those who responded to the scenes of the attacks, and countless others who supported victims and their families over time, remind us that there are heroes among us and that, by working together, we are stronger.

The SUNY Oneonta Alumni Association will host the college’s annual remembrance ceremony tomorrow, Friday, Sept. 10, at 9 a.m. at the 9/11 memorial sculpture on the upper quad outside of Fitzelle Hall. The event is open to everyone and will feature special music, the University Police Department's honor guard, and a presentation of a wreath and flowers. Masks and social distancing are encouraged for all who attend.

Milne Library is also hosting an educational exhibit, September 11, 2001: The Day That Changed the World, featuring archival photographs and images of artifacts from the 9/11 Memorial and Museum. This exhibit is available to view through Sept. 30 on the third floor of the library, outside of the Alden Room.

I encourage everyone to reach out to a friend, family member or colleague who might need extra support as we approach this significant anniversary. Collectively, we can honor the memory of those we lost and commemorate the resiliency of our communities and our nation.

Sincerely,

Alberto J.F. Cardelle
President​​​​​​​

Sept. 7 message to students

Sept. 7 message to employees

Sept. 7 message to families

Sept. 7 message to alumni

Read Transcript: SUNY Oneonta Presidential Transition

Dennis Craig: Hello, Red Dragons! August is here and the college is gearing up to welcome our new and continuing students in just a few short weeks. That also means that my time as acting president is winding down. As you know, a new president has been named to begin in a permanent role starting in September.

Dr. Alberto Cardelle and I have already begun meeting and I believe his passion and commitment to student success, diversity, equity, and inclusion, and public health are among many characteristics that will serve our college well for years to come.

Serving as acting president for the last ten months has been a privilege and I am proud to have been part of such a resilient community. Students, faculty, staff and alumni all banded together to support one another during a tenuous time by remaining true to the supportive community that Oneonta has always been. My sincere thanks for the hard work put in by everyone across the college.

I will continue to serve as acting president until September 3. Until then, we have much that we will accomplish together in the weeks ahead as we prepare for the fall semester. Our work continues to move forward on improving communication, planning graduation activities for the classes of 2020 and 2021, and focusing on enrollment initiatives that bring Oneonta back to the environment we enjoyed prior to the pandemic. Please stay tuned for important updates and ways you can support these efforts and stay informed in the weeks ahead.

After my departure, I will continue to be invested in the success of SUNY Oneonta and offer my continued support as a colleague and friend.

It is now my pleasure to introduce Dr. Alberto Cardelle, who is very eager to officially arrive on campus next month.

Dr. Alberto Cardelle: Hello SUNY Oneonta! I am so pleased to have a chance to introduce myself, express my gratitude and briefly present my plans for when I arrive on campus.

First, I would like to thank Acting President Craig for those kind words and to acknowledge how very appreciative I am for his willingness to generously share of his time, counsel and support as I prepare to join the Red Dragon family next month.

It is very clear that this community has been working hard over the past year to overcome significant challenges. Most importantly it is clear that you have been supporting one another to stay on track and remain a strong academic institution. Your strength of spirit is admirable, and I feel privileged to have the opportunity to work with individuals who are so kind, committed, and passionate.
I pursued this role because of my belief in the transformative role of public higher education, a commitment to equity and a strong sense of optimism about the potential future generations hold to continue to improve our world.

And I plan to use those principles to direct my work with you in achieving the collective vision of this institution. During this first year I hope to first of all implement the thorough plans already developed to ensure that we complete the academic year safely. I will also want to spend time meeting with all of you listening. This will help me better work with you in setting out a plan for rebuilding a sense of community both on campus and in the city and town of Oneonta.

I can’t wait to meet you all in person and introduce you to my family – my wife Dr. Rachel Frick Cardelle, and my daughters Marianela, Catalina and Josephine.

I have heard a lot about the vibrant student life, quality academic programs and the many campus traditions. It is an honor to be joining your community and I will continue to stay in touch throughout the next month and I look forward to all that we will accomplish together.