A look at what's new at the Ross School of Business

September is always an exciting time of year here at the School. New and returning students bring such a terrific energy as they arrive on campus. It is really a time of celebration and renewal for our community.

As we all get started on our work together for the next eight months, the table to the right presents an overview of "what's new" around here - including the new students joining our community and a few other items that are new and/or forthcoming:

What else is new? As most of you are now aware, this Fall our community has adopted a new set of procedures covering academic honesty, student conduct, and faculty-student disputes. They are the result of a terrific team effort between students, faculty, and staff over the last year-and-a-half. Please make sure that you are familiar with and support these responsibilities.

You may have also noticed that we have even better space this year - even though there is most definitely less of it to go around.

Our greatest challenge continues to be classrooms for our BBA program. We have worked hard with LS&A to house many of our core courses in their classrooms. We've upgraded the technology in those classrooms to ensure the right learning experience in classes held over there. In addition, we have managed to keep most BBA electives - especially those commonly taken by senior BBAs - here at the School.

Over the Summer, the Facilities group led by John Bresette and Jim Murdock worked hard to upgrade our remaining classrooms. Highlights of these home improvements include:

 Remodeling E0530 and E1530 to provide tiered seating in a discussion format.

 Adding electrical and computer network connections to each seat in those two classrooms plus K1310, K1320, E0540, E0550, E1540 and E1550.

 Upgrading of the primary restrooms in all three corridors of the E building.

 Renovating the third floor east of Kresge Library to provide 17 interview rooms for the Office of Career Development and Admissions. These rooms will be available as group study rooms when not in use by OCD or Admissions.

Despite all these efforts, we know that the next two years will still be a challenge for everyone on the facilities front. We will all have to pull together to navigate this period given the space constraints we face. Hopefully, we will come through it all in great shape and be an even tighter community as a result of our efforts.

The bottom line on all of the above is that this looks to be another strong year at the School. I hope you'll agree that the above improvements all add up to a great deal of momentum for us as we start the new Academic Year.

There's also lots of work to be done together. At the end of last year, students, faculty, and staff gathered for a series of forums designed to help identify future initiatives for the school - especially with regard to admissions, alumni relations, branding, communications, curriculum, culture, leadership development, placement, and student life. We'll be looking to make significant strides forward in all of these areas, particularly:

 Getting the right mix of people into our programs

 Ensuring the best possible experience in core courses

 Making the right set of elective opportunities available

 Facilitating a vibrant student life and community experience

 Offering the best possible set of leadership development opportunities

 Providing the right combination of career opportunities and job search support

 Strengthening our alumni database and network

 Creating an integrated marketing communications plan to build our brand

Ultimately, our success is really about the people and ideas that come out of our community. Once you've accepted the invitation to join our community, it ultimately comes down to how well the work we do together here prepares you for the journey ahead - the difference your experience in the Ross community makes in your life and the difference you will make in the lives of others.

With that in mind, Dean Dolan and I wish you all a great start to the academic year and look forward to working together with everyone to make sure Ross continues to be the best business school community in the world.