As we begin the 2008-2009 academic year, I would like to take the opportunity to welcome all TGS students, and particularly our new students, to the Northwestern community. While The Graduate School is not your primary academic home at Northwestern, our exceptionally dedicated and highly competent staff is committed to supporting your progress every step of the way in your graduate career, by assisting to make available the financial backing you need to complete your programs successfully, by providing a host of professional development and social activities for students, and through many less visible channels including the oversight of all academic Masters and PhD programs at NU. Here, I would like to point out just a few of the initiatives that TGS has recently introduced that illustrate our commitment to providing you with the best possible environment in which to grow as a scholar and as a person.

TGS is committed to building a community of graduate students both inside and outside of departments and programs. For many years we have sponsored a variety of student organizations and we encourage all graduate students to take part in their activities. This year, we are pleased to sponsor over twenty student-generated community building opportunities, made possible via our community building grant program. Through these activities, which range from a graduate student curling club, to groups interested in swing dancing, community gardening, and entrepreneurship in engineering, we hope to create situations in which graduate students from a variety of programs can meet each other to exchange ideas, blow off steam, and escape for a time the stress which is inevitably part of graduate education. Student Life and Multicultural Affairs' Web site includes a full list of funded proposals and information about how to hook up with any of these activities.  By all means seek out a community building activity that fits your interests. Moreover, you should keep an eye out for announcements for the TGS Nights Out, evening events at local establishments, and TGS Days Out, events for students with families, that provide our community with additional opportunities for "interdisciplinary" activity outside the lab, library and classroom.

TGS is also committed to enhancing the professional development of our students through the provision of a variety of seminars that focus on topics not generally covered very well by individual academic departments. These programs, which are incorporated under the initiative "NU Directions," include:

• two all-day programs professional development conferences that give students a broad view of topics such as securing external grants, the academic job search, and developing a teaching portfolio,

• regular meetings on topics such as intellectual property and copyright and the non-academic job search,

• a certificate program Preparing Future Faculty, and

• a number of evening forums (dubbed TGS Town Halls) devoted to issues facing higher education in general and Northwestern students in particular.

I must say I very much enjoy these Town Halls, as they provide me with a regular, scheduled opportunity to meet with students and hear your thoughts on these issues, as well. I should say here on the topic of professional development, that in addition to the excellent work of TGS staff on your behalf, the offices of the Searle Center for Teaching Excellence, Fellowships, and Career Services partner with us to deliver these programs.

Your study at Northwestern is concurrent with a time of profound University investment in doctoral study. New endowment resources have been dedicated to The Graduate School to improve the quality of our academic programs across the board, a dedication that will result in new academic and research opportunities, as well as quality of life improvements for all graduate students. As part of our fund to “build a better student,” we have added a year and a summer of fellowship guaranteed to students in many disciplines, increased significantly the resources for Conference Travel Grants and for Graduate Research Grants, funds available to students above and beyond those provided by stipends and scholarship. These resource increases follow additional commitments made in the past year to fund more research fellowships and language acquisition grants for students. As resources become available, we look forward to increasing the amount of fellowship quarters available to students, as well as to increase stipend levels in areas where we might not be seen as competitive. This year, we also plan to launch our “dependent care travel grant” program, another initiative to make TGS and Northwestern that much more family friendly. We'll look forward to engaging our students in public discussion this year about the best use of new resources.

We constantly strive at TGS to innovate in order to enhance your experience as a Northwestern graduate student. We are, of course, always interested in your comments and suggestions, which should be directed to whichever member of our staff (up to and including me) has responsibility for the area that concerns you. Again, a warm welcome to you all for the 2008-09 academic year.

Andrew Wachtel
Dean, The Graduate School