Looking ahead

It’s hard to believe that my fourth year as CHC Dean is winding to a close. Or speeding to a close, I should say, since it seems just the other day that we were getting used to talking about the year 2023. With the rain pelleting my window in Chapman Hall and the bright green of McCaslin Lawn in the background, it’s an excellent moment to give you a sneak preview of what we are looking forward to in 2024 here in the CHC.

• CHC senior Nayantara Arora has been awarded a Rhodes Scholarship for graduate study at the University of Oxford. Nayantara is the first Rhodes Scholar from the UO since 2007. We are excited to celebrate her many achievements as she finishes up her undergraduate education, defends her thesis, and prepares to launch into her next adventure.
   
• Over the past five years, I’ve had the privilege of co-editing a book about women intellectuals who made and researched media industries in the 1940's and 1950's. Few people know their names today, because many women lost their jobs during the height of McCarthyism. With extraordinary support from students in the Clark Honors College, the School of Journalism and Communication, and Women’s and Gender Studies (several of whom contributed articles to the book), the book will be published in January 2024. We’ll be hosting a book launch of The Ghost Reader in February to showcase this excellent student work.
   
• In March we have the opportunity to discuss the Clark Honors College with the UO Board of Trustees . Board members will learn about the curious and committed students who come to the UO because of the CHC and hear about the skills they acquire and take out into the world to become transformational leaders. We look forward to sharing some of the awe we feel at serving our remarkable students and alums.  
   
• Last year’s inaugural Three Minute Thesis event was a shining success. The idea for the event, known informally as the 3MT, came from the University of Queensland in Australia. Since then, the competition has been adopted by many institutions around the world, including UO’s Graduate School. For the CHC 3MT event, seniors working on their theses have just three minutes and one PowerPoint slide to present the ideas behind their research to a general audience. The judges and audience members last year were awed by the diversity and complexity of the finalists’ presentations. You can find the video recording of the 2023 event here. We are busy planning for the next competition, which will be held in April 2024.
   
• We will be co-hosting a Zoom webinar on April 4 featuring Courtney Thorsson, a core CHC faculty member. Professor Thorsson is the author of the recently published The Sisterhood: How a Network of Black Women Writers Changed American Culture. Look for information about how to join us for this event soon.
   
• As some of you remember all too well, May is peak thesis season! With close to 200 seniors set to graduate in June 2024, the number of thesis defenses to be scheduled this spring will hit an all-time high.
   

We look forward to sharing insights from our students' theses with you later in 2024. In the meantime, from all of us in the CHC, we wish you a warm and nourishing end to the year.

Sincerely,

Carol Stabile

Acting Dean