From Laurel’s Desk – Fall 2017 | Academic Newsletter | Seneca Polytechnic

in the Fall 2017 issue

Welcome to the 2017/2018 academic year at Seneca!

This week, we are welcoming thousands of new and returning students to our campuses and classrooms. It is an exciting time for us all, only eclipsed by convocation where we celebrate the learning journey of our students and their transition from Seneca students to Seneca graduates and alumni. This is our work: to inspire and support student learning to enable students to achieve their dream of a career or to access further education.

Our halls are crowded with students trying to navigate the campus. They have come to Seneca from around the corner and around the world and they have all come for a common reason: to learn and to learn at Seneca from and with faculty, staff and peers in a welcoming and supportive environment, while we challenge our students and have high expectations of them. Our job is to prepare them for the workplace or further education through relevant programs and curriculum that presents opportunities for students to demonstrate their learning in a variety of ways.

Over the summer, we hired a large number of full-time faculty, most of whom are not new to Seneca. I had the pleasure to meet many of them and was very impressed by their experience, energy, and their absolute commitment to teaching. I look forward to hearing about their contributions.

We are launching a number of new programs this year. New program development is integral to our continued success and I would like to acknowledge the hard work of faculty and staff who saw the ideas through to the first day of class. Connected to new program development, our enrolment is moving in the right direction with increases in applications attributable to our new programs.

We have many “irons in the fire”: development of a digital learning strategy, new program development, renewal of a number of degrees, continued work on infusing Seneca’s Core Literacies throughout all of programs, increasing cross-disciplinary and experiential learning opportunities, within the institution and internationally. And more. All of this points to a vibrant college focused on student learning.

You may recall that I noted our last Academic Newsletter was “pushing the limits of a newsletter.” I am pleased to say that we have broken another record with this edition. Another edition at more than 20 pages is a signal that we need to publish the Newsletter more frequently, which we are happy to do, as long as the submissions keep coming!

I wish you much success this semester and look forward to celebrating Seneca’s 50th with you on October 23rd!

Laurel

Photo credit: Jordann Rae, second semester student in the Independent Digital Photography Program

View the Fall 2017 issue of the Academic Newsletter.