Dean's Update - August 15, 2025

Dear Colleagues:

Our provost has shared with the deans and vice provosts a document entitled “Nancy Brickhouse User’s Manual.” It combines laudable self-knowledge and a practical desire to help us benefit from her leadership. In connection with last week’s annual provost’s retreat, she asked the deans and vice provosts to write similar user manuals, and to consider sharing them within our own circles. Mine is a work in progress, but here are highlights:

Availability

• Office hours. Daily in Alexander 130. Drop-ins welcome; appointments encouraged.
• Communication. Personal conversation preferable, followed by email, text, and phone. I have aversions to Google Meet, Teams, and Zoom, but will show up when needed.

What Others Can Do to Help Me Work Well (with a nod to Plato’s Gorgias)

1. Bring knowledge to the table. Good insights may be offered based on general understanding, experience, or sound intuition. Studied perspective grounded in fair consideration of evidence and awareness of alternatives is especially useful.
2. Be forthright. I want to know who you really are and what you really think. Hedging arguments, soft-pedaling doubts, or tamping down enthusiasm are strategies that will underwhelm me and frustrate you. Be yourself and openly share your views.
3. Extend good will. Day in and day out, perfect agreement is unlikely. Whether we agree or disagree, however, good will is non-negotiable. Love and respect help us listen, motivate concessions to each other’s benefit, and embody the way of Jesus.

Sources of Joy in My Work

1. Generosity. If you need something, ask. When possible, I will give what I can to anyone who asks. It makes me happy to help you succeed and find satisfaction in your work.
2. Humor. Aristotle named wit as a virtue, a mean between boorishness and buffoonery. Good humor, friendly repartee, funny stories, mirth, etc. temper sober deliberation and hard calls. Wit involves the right thing, at the right time, in the right way, for the right reasons.
3. Shared credit. I like the spotlight to shine on others. Help me know what you’ve done so that I can honor it, express gratitude, and rally others to celebrate.

This fall begins a new five-year term of appointment for me as dean. Our mission—embodied in each of you and exercised for our students in service to Christ—motivates me every day. Thank you for your confidence in us and the good work to which we’re called.

Here are things to know in the life of the Honors College:

• Our fall semester faculty and staff meeting will be Thursday, August 28 from 3:30-5:00 p.m. in the Willett Family Reading Room (Alexander Hall). Make every effort to attend this important time of information sharing and conversation.

• Following the start of classes, you are welcome to attend a weekly time of prayer for students, staff, and faculty. Honors College Prayers will take place each Tuesday, 8:40-9:00 a.m., in Memorial Chapel, with a quick cup of coffee together thereafter. Prayer time will include scripture reading, prayer, and a hymn. Thanks to Mike Stegemoller, Jason Whitt, and Lizzy Rice for organizing this opportunity.

• Eight new colleagues are joining our academic community this fall. New faculty include Casie Cobos, lecturer in rhetoric (BIC); Brittany Tausen, assistant professor of social psychology (BIC); and Kirsten Welch, assistant professor of philosophy (GTX). We have four new postdoctoral teaching fellows: Kirsten Anderson (GTX), Matthew Parnell (BIC), Charles Regli (BIC/GTX) and Lauren Seitz (BIC). At the interface of academic and residential life, Lizzy Rice is our new HRC program director. Welcome, colleagues!

• Every year, activity reports from faculty are due by mid-January. To generate these reports, Digital Measures is out and a new Faculty Activity Reporting (FAR) resource is in. Vice Provost DeAnna Toten Beard will provide an overview on October 3 (12-1 p.m.) via Teams and is available for one-on-one support in late November, December, and January. You may quickly get up to speed with a user guide here.

• Do you know about NetVUE (the Network for Vocation in Undergraduate Education)? Among its resources is a new slate of Grants to Individuals for Vocational Exploration. Open to faculty and staff in amounts from $5,000 to $25,000, this opportunity supports “innovative projects in the scholarship, pedagogy, leadership, and/or practice of vocation in undergraduate education.” Explore this and other NetVUE grant opportunities and let me know where your good ideas take you.

• Two fantastic endowed lectures are planned this fall. Both deserve robust attendance!

  • David Beasley, distinguished professor of practice & public service at the University of South Carolina school of law, former executive director of the United Nations World Food Programme (2017-2023) and Governor of South Carolina (1995-1999) will present the Laura Blanche Jackson Endowed Lecture in World Issues on Tuesday, October 21 at 7:00 p.m. in the Baylor Club Ballroom. His lecture title is “Global Order: War, Conflict, Stability, and the Nobel Peace Prize.”
  • Jennifer Frey, professor of philosophy at the University of Tulsa, will present the Drumwright Family Lectureon Tuesday, November 11 at 4:00 p.m. in the Willett Family Reading Room in Alexander Hall. Her lecture title is TBD, but will include a spirited defense of the liberal arts, consonant with convictions expressed in her recent essay in the New York Times 

All the best,

Douglas V. Henry, Ph.D. |  Dean
Honors College | Baylor University
baylor.edu/honorscollege | 254.710.7689