A Note from Provost Haggerty

March 31, 2023

Dear Colleagues,

As I have met with faculty and their departments over this academic year, I have been overwhelmed with the talent of our faculty and staff.  I have been particularly impressed with the scholarship and creative activity of the early career faculty I have met and learned about.  For example, this academic year, seven LSU faculty have received an NSF CAREER award, in seven departments in four different colleges.  LSU has averaged about three awards per year, so this is an exceptional accomplishment by our newest faculty.  Most importantly, it puts LSU and our students in good shape for more success in the future. The awardees are:

  • Adam Forte, Geology & Geophysics, College of Science
  • Rui Han, Mathematics, College of Science
  • Christine Lattin, Biology, College of Science
  • Shyam Menon, Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, College of Engineering
  • Paul Miller, Oceanography & Coastal Sciences, Coast & Environment
  • Justin Wilson, Physics, College of Science
  • Don Zhang, Psychology, College of Humanities & Social Sciences

And the success is not just in the STEM fields. Another exceptional achievement was the Han & Heung Festival, a groundbreaking collaboration between the School of Music and the larger LSU community that you can read about below.

Dr. Nicholas Serrano and Dr. Fabio Capra-Ribeiro, Assistant Professors of Landscape Architecture and Architecture respectively and their students of Landscape Architecture, Civil Engineering, and Architecture have been working together with the mayor and community foundation to support resiliency planning in Calcasieu and Cameron Parishes. 

Dr. Julie Schneider and her co-investigator, Dr. Jana Oetting, were awarded a $365,766 grant from NSF. Led by Schneider, the study will be the first of its kind to investigate community-based and dialect-based differences in vocabulary throughout the Deep South, in an effort to improve existing interventions which seek to close academic achievement gaps in childhood.

LSU also recently celebrated 10 years of Science Café. Over 10 years, many dozens of faculty – and not just in STEM – have presented their work to the Baton Rouge community.  Special thanks to the Office of Research and Economic Development, who have sponsored Science Café over its life, and to Chief of Staff Ashley Arceneaux and Interim VP and Dean of Agriculture Matt Lee, who together launched Science Café a decade ago.

If you would like to read more about LSU’s scholarship impact across the state, please check out Working for Louisiana.

And speaking of scholarship, I joined President Tate on part of his Scholarship First bus tour, in which he covered 1,000 miles and spoke to hundreds of our fellow citizens, along with business leaders and legislators about the excellent work of our faculty, staff and students.

These are just a few examples of the many great things LSU faculty have accomplished recently. I look forward to seeing more to come. 

Sincerely,

Roy Haggerty
Executive Vice President & Provost