PUBLISHED BY THE BOSTON COLLEGE OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY COMMUNICATIONS
SUMMER 2023 EDITION
51 New Faculty Ready to Start BC Careers
Tall Order
BY SEAN SMITH CHRONICLE EDITOR
Facilities workers repaired Fulton Hall windows recently—one of more than 70 campus projects underway this summer. See page 3. photo by lee pellegrini
Boston College will welcome 51 new faculty members for the 2023-2024 academic year, including a Nobel laureate, a new director of the African and African Diaspora Studies (AADS) program, and four additional faculty in the two-year-old Engineering Department. The 51 tenured or tenure-track faculty and full-time professors of the practice will be joined by an additional nine lateral hires—previously visiting faculty members who are now professors of the practice. Also coming to campus for the next academic year are 22 new, visiting full-time faculty members who are on limited-term contracts.
While smaller than last year’s record 62, this year’s cohort of new full-time, non-visiting faculty represents another significant milestone, according to University administrators: 33 of the 51 are women, the highest such percentage (65) of new hires in BC history. More than a quarter of the new full-time, non-visiting faculty members—27 percent—are AHANA, they noted. But straightforward statistical analysis only goes so far in evaluating the annual faculty hiring process, so vital to making major institutional goals for teaching and academics a day-to-day reality in BC classrooms. The number of hires in a given year can be affected by internal considerations—how many faculty are needed for a particular
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University Reacts to Court’s Ruling End of affirmative action seen as ‘challenge’ to fostering diversity in higher education racial groups. “Boston College has greatly benefited from a student body of varied backBoston College administrators, faculty, grounds, which has enriched intellectual and students offered strong reactions to discourse and social life on our campus,” the June 29 United States Supreme Court Fr. Leahy said in his statement. This fall’s ruling that struck down affirmative action, incoming first-year class is BC’s most acending the long-established precedent of complished and racially diverse ever, with colleges and universities using race as a a record 39 percent of students identifyfactor in their admissions decisions. ing as AHANA and 11 percent who are Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. issued first-generation college students. the decision for the majority, which inAccording to the statement, “The Unicluded Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel versity intends to remain faithful to its A. Alito Jr., Neil M. Gorsuch, Brett M. Jesuit, Catholic intellectual and religious Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. “The heritage by enrolling talented, diverse stustudent must be treated based on his or dents from across the United States and her experiences as an individual—not on the world within the new parameters set the basis of race,” Roberts wrote. “Many by the Court.” universities have for too long done just BC will accomplish this, “by building the opposite. And in doing so, they have on its strong relationships with schools concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone and community-based organizations and of an individual’s identity is not challenges through its membership in QuestBridge, bested, skills built, or lessons learned but a national nonprofit program that helps the color of their skin. Our constitutional outstanding high-need students earn history does not tolerate that choice.” scholarships to attend top colleges and University President William P. Leahy, universities.” S.J., issued a statement calling the Court’s As a need-blind institution, BC also ruling a frustrating departure from a will maintain its commitment to underdecades-long judicial precedent. “Consid- resourced students by allocating millions eration of race in admissions decisions has of dollars to need-based undergraduate enabled higher education institutions like financial aid—including an expenditure of Boston College to identify, enroll, and more than $166 million in 2023-2024— graduate talented students from diverse and through its academic support proBY SEAN SMITH CHRONICLE EDITOR
Maggie Galvin with University President William P. Leahy, S.J. photo by lee pellegrini
Galvin Wins BC Service Award BY ROSANNE PELLEGRINI STAFF WRITER
Mary “Maggie” Galvin—a self-described “behind-the-scenes person”—found herself in the spotlight recently, when she was honored with the 2023 Boston College Community Service Award for her commitment to improve the lives of children, teens, and adults in the City of Boston. Organized by the Office of Governmental and Community Affairs, the award highlights the outstanding contributions of a BC employee whose actions exemplify the Jesuit spirit of service to others. Galvin, assistant director of advancement talent in University Advancement, was lauded for
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grams offered through BC’s Pine Manor Institute for Student Success. Next year, the University will open Messina College, a two-year residential program “that will provide a pathway to higher education and increased opportunities for approximately 100 students each year.” The post-affirmative action landscape “will pose significant challenges in student recruitment and enrollment for all colleges and universities,” the statement concluded, “but while the law has changed, the values and goals of Boston College have not. The University remains com-
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INSIDE 3 Busy Summer
Facilities personnel tackling 72 campus projects.
5 Next Generation
C21 provides update on Student Voices Project.
8 A Good Run
BC, the starting line for the Greater Boston Track Club, was the setting for its 50th anniversary bash.