Offering Support to Newtown

We were in Newtown twice yesterday and President Obama will be there today.

As I had written in my most recent post, we go through Newtown, Connecticut fairly regularly as a transit point en route to and from seeing relatives.

We were to have been in Newtown  on Friday morning, when the horrific tragedy took place. However, although I am on sabbatical this year, I decided it would be appropriate and interesting to attend a Faculty Meeting and I wanted to to see colleagues and staff who were being honored at the Isenberg School of Management and to recognize all that they do for the school. There was a reception afterwards in our atrium.

Our trip was delayed by a day and, yesterday, to honor the victims of the shootings at the Sandy Hook Elementary School and the grieving family members and community, we stopped there in the morning and then again in the evening. We were picking up our daughter from college for winter break since her last final exam was yesterday.

In a small way, we wanted to offer comfort to those that we saw from the owners of the Blue Colonial Diner with the wreath below, to the waitresses and workers there, and even to the journalists. Last night, while having dinner there, I spoke with two Swedish female journalists who were seated at the table next to us. I immediately recognized the language since I spend so much time in Sweden. "How can anyone make sense of this?" one of them said to me. We saw the TV news vehicles with satellite dishes and many reporters. The diner was packed both in the morning and in the evening and one waitress said that she had known all the children who perished. In a small community one can't help but recognize and interact with others.

Several said to us that "Friday was the hardest day" and the weariness and pain of all was palpable.

On a bridge someone had hung up a big hand-made banner which said: "We love (in the form of a big blue heart) Sandy Hook Elementary School."

Newtown -- When a Horrific Tragedy Strikes a Beautiful Community

The horrifying news from Newtown on a beautiful Friday morning when children were in school, parents were at work or at home, during a season that is to be filled with peace and joy, has shocked the country and the world.

We have been to Newtown, Connecticut many times as a drive-through town en route to visit relatives. We stop and eat at the Blue Colony Diner in Newtown. What we have enjoyed in the diner is not only the delicious food, but also the warm service, and the people that we see there -- very friendly, in groups,  enjoying one another. This diner in this community has been a respite for my family on many trips.

What can only be viewed as a terrorist attack at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, with even President Obama delivering a very moving speech, as a loving father,  signals, in an extremely painful way, that our society is losing some of its core foundations.

We can take some solace, as we grapple with this tragedy, that, as the events unfolded, there were so many heroes at the school -- including  teachers who secured, sheltered, and protected the children.

When I saw the news I, as many others, was shell-shocked, and I immediately reached my husband, who is a faculty member at the University of Hartford.

He told me that he had been to Sandy Hook Elementary School in the late 1990s when he was the Connecticut Space Grant Director. He was there to give an award to the school's kindergarten class, at that time, for their development of a "Magic Treehouse" type set of web pages on Space Exploration. When he  visited the school,  he also brought with him a set of books on space for  its library.


Reach out to one another, especially to the innocent children, and live each day to the fullest. Do what you can in and for your communities.

Our deepest sympathies to all those who suffered incalculable losses of loved ones. We are all thinking of you and have you in our hearts and prayers.

Cookie Supply Chains for the Holidays

This is a very special time of the year with festivities, holiday decorations, bright lights, and many pleasant get-togethers.

This is also a time when some of us very much enjoy baking cookies and delivering the finished products to friends and neighbors.

I have written about my cookie baking in the past and am glad that I am joined by other academic colleagues, who enjoy baking as much as I do, and who also post photos of the finished products -- thanks to Dr. Laura McLay and to  Dr. Tallys Yunes  and I am sure that there are others.

This year, the inputs into my cookie production processes included: almonds, walnuts, and pecans from California, chocolate from Switzerland, rum from Bermuda (which we brought back a few years ago), cherries from Florida, flour and sugar, local eggs, yummy vanilla, and local jam.

I had done R&D to innovate my cookie selection this year, and included a recipe from my wonderful Swedish staff person at the School of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Gothenburg, Ms. Hall, who not only had baked some of these delicious Swedish cookies for me but had also provided me with the recipe.

I procured many of the ingredients several nights ago and last evening had the assembly line up and running. As one batch of cookies baked (pecan sandies, almond treats with cherries, Swedish tarts with jam, coconut macaroons dipped in chocolate, and more ) I also made rum balls, which did not require baking. We academics are really good at parallel processing (multitasking) as well as scheduling. My other innovation this year was to use parchment paper -- no cookies sticking and easy cleanup (my husband's job). This helped with the efficiency.

The joy of baking! Not only did the house smell great from all the aromas but it was also a lot of fun to arrange the cookies on plates for delivery. I will spare you the photos of what the sink looked like.

Today, I delivered some packaged plates and the ones below will be delivered over the next day or so,

 

As for the cookies that I sampled -- a baker needs to make sure the finished product is delicious -- I can attest that the pecan sandies and the rum balls were the best that I have ever made.

And, I heard even from one of my former undergrads in Operations Management at the Isenberg School of Management, who said that he was getting ready to make my rum balls for his family for Christmas (I had given him the recipe since he had sampled some at one of our INFORMS Student Chapter parties and the rum balls have become a tradition in his family).

The greatest pleasure is seeing the smiles on faces when we ring the doorbell to give a plate of our cookies!

Transportation (and consumption) are also essential components of cookie supply chains!

Of course, it is also great to practice what you preach and to show that their is actually some  scholarship involved I managed to find a research article on a bakery that cites one of our supply chain papers. 

Great Tips on How to Get a Tenure Track Job in Academia and Then How to Get Tenure

The academic job market this year, at least in such fields as operations research / management science / operations management, is terrific, judging not only by the number of openings for tenure-track faculty positions and job listings, but also from the number of campus interview visits that my most senior doctoral student has secured this year.

This is great news for our discipline!

Last Friday, we hosted one of my former doctoral students, Dr. Jose M. Cruz, who received 5 degrees from UMass Amherst and who is now a tenured Associate Professor and Ackerman Scholar and Director of the Masters Program in Business Analytics and Program Management at the School of Business at the University of Connecticut (UConn). He gave a fabulous presentation, the slides of which,  he has given us permission to share. His talk was on The Myths and Facts of How to Get a Tenure Track Academic Job and How to get Tenure.

The slides of his presentation can be downloaded in pdf format here.

He interspersed his presentation with many anecdotes and real life experiences and enthralled the audience with useful tips and with his energy and insights gained from many practical experiences.

The slides are easy to follow and very useful and enjoyable (of course, not as great as actually being there but very helpful, nonetheless).

Some photos from his talk and the UMass Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter party that followed have already been posted.

The Isenberg School of Management constructed a nice photo album of our activities that day. on Facebook.

UMass Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter Hosts an Alum and a Great Party

Yesterday, was the last day of classes at UMass Amherst and we had the pleasure of hosting one of our distinguished alums, Dr. Jose M. Cruz, who has 5 degrees from UMass Amherst, including an MBA and PhD with  a concentration in Management Science from the Isenberg School. I was his doctoral dissertation committee chair and am very proud of him. He received his promotion to Associate Professor with tenure at the School of Business at the University of Connecticut this past year and has received accolades for his teaching and his research.

 Many of the students who are part of the UMass Amherst INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences) Student Chapter helped out with the hosting of the talk and with the party afterwards. Our students know how to do logistics-- I was impressed!

He spoke on The Myths and Facts of How to Get a Tenure-Track Job and How to get Tenure and we will be posting his slides soon since this topic is of interest to many PhD students and Assistant Professors. His insights and energy were amazing and we listened mesmerized. The feedback and questions for the audience were also terrific.

Lunch at the University Club, in a building dating to 1728 (but not the food which was exquisite)

His talk started at 2PM and lasted until shortly before 4PM (there was a lot of territory to cover) and at 4:30PM our end of the semester party was scheduled in the same room. As is our tradition, we had international cuisine and it was truly a fabulous way in which to mark the end of another semester. The students handled the logistics of procuring the food, and preparing it in some cases, and then transporting it in a timely manner. The food was so delicious!!! Although I have been engrossed in writing a long research paper I baked cookies and we even brought varenyky (pierogies, for some of you) and kielbasa. We had all earned our appetites.
 The delicious international cuisine at the UMass Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter Party

It takes a lot of people to build a community and this student chapter with members from the Isenberg School of Management and the College of Engineering I commend not only on its great activities, but on its creativity, organizational skills, and the esprit de corps of its members. Student members are from the US, India, Korea, China, Nigeria, Iran, Turkey, and other countries and they work so well together.
Some photos of the great people who came to our party

 

 

There is hope for the world when I see such great students.

We had fun and Dr. Cruz also enjoyed the party very much!

If I Were Dean

I have been approached over the years by headhunters and by administrators as well as faculty asking me whether I would be interested in being a Dean.

Having seen a lot as a faculty member, not only at my own university, but also at other universities at which I have had various appointments (Harvard, MIT, Brown, the Royal Institute of Technology, the University of Innsbruck, and, most recently, the University of Gothenburg), and having had numerous discussions with many faculty and having served on numerous search committees, I have given such invitations serious thought and consideration.

I have been a faculty member under "permanent," interim, and, my favorite -- "acting" deans. I have also worked under DITS (just this past weekend a colleague told me that this acronym stands for "Dean in Training").

Dr. Christina Paxson, the recently inducted new President of Brown University, in an interview published in BAM, stated why she moved into administration: “When you’re not an administrator,” she explained, “your impact can be great, but it’s still somewhat limited to your own students and your own research. When you move into administration, if you do well, you have a positive impact on the education and research of a lot of people. You sort of amplify what you can do.”

Indeed, she nailed it -- having a positive impact. But what concrete steps can result in a truly positive impact?

If I were Dean I would:

• Communicate regularly with faculty and outside constituencies through such simple (but very important) things as giving pats on the back for great work, writing a nice personal note, making sure that newsletters are published and are online, publicizing accomplishments to all electronically and otherwise.  I would nominate my deserving faculty for rewards, awards,  and recognitions and would celebrate their achievements, recognizing that different individuals have different strengths and talents. A wonderful past Dean would have flowers delivered to my office and even to my home when there was a notable accomplishment and I still have certain thank you notes from him. (Is it surprising that he was also outstanding at raising funds -- clearly not -- everyone responded to his genuine warmth and caring and although he is no longer a Dean, he is still sought after for advice).  
• Have integrity and right wrongs when and where needed. Be proactive. I have seen too much of a "it's a departmental issue." But if there is no leadership at the departmental level, this is a major copout.  True leadership MUST come from the top. My model of a truly outstanding Dean was Dean Robert J. Birgeneau of MIT. He was the Dean of the School of Science at MIT who not only established the Committee on Women Faculty with a report that demonstrated with data how women faculty were marginalized there and what was needed to be done. You can read the historic events in The MIT Faculty Newsletter Special Edition. The study and analyses demonstrated that making institutional change must come from the top and that administrative support is needed. The problems that needed to be addressed regarding female faculty included:  unequal resources and rewards; undervaluation of equal accomplishments, marginalization of women as they rise (this never stops, does it?), family-work conflicts, and the small number of female faculty. Now for a fascinating fact -- in 1960 there were ZERO female faculty in science and engineering at MIT. Birgeneau helped tremendously to change the environment at MIT but, once he left, the momentum receded.  He left MIT to go to UC Berkeley and the hiring of female faculty went flat again.  If you have the time (I listened and watched spellbound) you can learn more about these issues in a video lecture by Dr. Nancy Hopkins of MIT given recently in Hong Kong, entitled:, "Addressing the Under-representation of Women Faculty in Science and Engineering at MIT - A Data-driven Approach" A faculty member at HKUST who was in the audience and is a dear friend brought this video to my attention. You can hear Dr. Hopkins talk about how she walked around at MIT at night with a tape measure to measure the lab spaces given to various faculty. 
• Support the intellectual life of the community. Education happens not only in the classroom but also outside the classroom. In a university it is essential to have speakers. I have personally used my own funds to support speakers over many years. You can see the lists over many semesters of individuals from whom we learned a tremendous amount. These talks were not required and we packed them in. Faculty came from throughout the UMass Amherst campus and some audience members came from as far as Boston, and even Vermont, and New Jersey. However, there comes a time when (and I did this for 14 semesters) when it is time for the administration to step up and support such activities and not just have a single female not only helping the students through the UMass Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter to organize the series but to also fund the majority of it.
• Shape the direction of the school through inputs from faculty, students, staff, alums, and other constituencies. Be a bridge builder. Without substance and content a "brand" has no meaning. A reputation is built on the quality of the curriculum, the advances in research and knowledge, and on the excellence in terms of both breadth and depth of outreach activities. It also rests on the ability to work as a team and with proper incentives in place.
• Give others a chance. Don't just appoint and reappoint those who have had opportunities in the past. Invite new faces to serve on important committees or as administrators, if they so wish to.

When Great Things Happen to Really Nice Professors -- Election to the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences

The great news arrived this morning from Sweden and came from a doctoral student who is doing some really interesting research.

He was notably proud and wanted to share the wonderful news about his doctoral dissertation advisor.

I have been smiling non-stop since it is special to see individuals who are not only scholars but who are genuine mentors to their students, colleagues, and beyond being recognized for their contributions. Also, when really nice people get recognized one gets the sense of some justice in this world.

Now for the news -- Dr. Jonas Woxenius of the School of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden is one of twenty-four elected recently to the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences. A news article can be found here and for those of you who are rusty in your Swedish (and thanks to Google translator and Niklas Arvidsson,  the proud doctoral student) you can read the translation to English below (with my edits):

Johan Woxenius, Professor of maritime logistics and transport economics at the School,  has been named a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, IVA.

Johan Woxenius has been elected to the IVA, Title III Planning. He has an MSc and a PhD in transport engineering from Chalmers. He is a Professor of business administration, with a focus on maritime logistics and transport economics at the School.

Woxenius is one of the driving forces in the cooperation between Chalmers and Göteborg University in competence centers Lighthouse Maritime and Northern Lead in logistics. He sits on the Göteborg Energi Research Council and is a board member for the School.

IVA chose the 24 new members at its recent academic gathering. Among those also noted: Klas Eklund, senior economist at SEB, Stockholm Stock Exchange CEO Jens Henriksson, Swedish Radio's former CEO Mats Svegfors and the President of Nordstjernan Viveca Ax: son Johnson. IVA was founded in 1919 and is the oldest engineering academy of sciences and has now 904 Swedish and 265 foreign members. 

Professor Woxenius has been a wonderful colleague during my visits to the School of Business, Economics and Law as a new Visiting Professor there. He is outstanding at organizing workshops and conferences and bicycles to work. Conveniently, our office suite even has a shower! His energy and enthusiasm light up the school and our suite of offices.

Below, in his honor, I have posted a photo taken at the Future Urban Transport conference, which took place in Gothenburg in October.

Congratulations to Professor Johan Woxenius on this great and much-deserved honor.

 

 Professor Woxenius is standing between me and Professor Michael Browne of the UK, who is also a Visiting Professor in our group at Gothenburg.

I have promised to take him out for a celebratory meal with treats when I am back in Gothenburg (Göteborg) and could not resist, to whet appetites, posting some of the treats in the city below.