February Message from Matina

Dear CNAS community,

I’m looking forward to seeing many of you next week for CNAS Research Day on March 4 at the CCIS PCL Lounge and online for Mornings with Matina on March 6.

I encourage you to RSVP here for CNAS Research Day on Wednesday and join us for a lively event. More than 60 students and postdoctoral scholars from across ALES, engineering and science will present their research during the poster sessions and research talks. A special thank you to president Bill Flanagan and Karim El-Basyouny, associate vice-president (Institutional Research Infrastructure and Initiatives) who will help us kick off the morning research talks with welcoming remarks. It’s going to be a great day of connection and curiosity.

At Mornings with Matina next Friday, I will be available to answer any questions that are on your mind regarding projects within CNAS, the university or more broadly about how events happening locally and globally impact the work that we do. As always, that forum is unstructured and allows us to connect, question and share. I hope to see you there.

Earlier this month, the university introduced a new set of values: curiosity, accountability, community and impact. In conversations with colleagues, it’s nice to hear how many resonate with these words. I encourage all of us to consider how we can weave these values into how we teach, learn, lead and serve. Curiosity calls us to ask better questions and remain open to new perspectives. Accountability challenges us to take ownership of our choices and uphold the trust placed in us. Community reminds us our greatest achievements are shared, built on respect and collaboration. And impact urges us to ensure our work — inside classrooms, labs, offices and beyond — makes a meaningful difference. Together, these values define who we are and who we aspire to be. Let’s bring them to life in the conversations we have, the decisions we make and the example we set for one another.

As always, if you would like to share any thoughts or ask questions, please reach out to me at deancnas@ualberta.ca.

Sincerely, 

Matina Kalcounis-Rueppell
Dean and Vice-Provost, College of Natural and Applied Sciences