LIKE A PHOENIX RISING—HOW ATTENTION TO CULTURE CREATED A PATHWAY TO REINSTATING OUR GEOSCIENCE DEPARTMENT

Geoscience has never been more critical to the future of our society. As climate changes and demands on water, minerals and other extractive resources increase, the geosciences represent the primary STEM field that addresses these issues. Despite this, there have been several recent cases of geoscience departments closing or under threat. Reasons for this are many, including lack of awareness, lack of a Geoscience Advanced Placement exam, and departments not adapting to new academic landscapes. All of these can lead to low enrollments and a lack of profile and identity for geoscience departments on college and university campuses. To pro-actively respond to these threats and resist punitive measures from college administrations, geoscience departments need to work to create collaborative and cooperative cultures to ensure that they are responding adequately to changes in academic institutions and creating growth opportunities for our science.

The NEW Geoscience Department at the University of Connecticut is an example of how departmental culture can influence a program’s fate. In 2003, the Department of Geology and Geophysics at UConn was dissolved and an integrative center was created in its place, moving all tenure faculty lines to other departments and colleges. After 10 years, the Center had outgrown its organizational structure and the faculty aimed to recreate the department. But this goal was not a given. It took 5 years to convince the university that Geoscience is a core STEM field that deserves its own department. This uphill climb required teamwork, as we revised and reconstructed our curriculum, recruited exceptional faculty, renovated labs and gained new lab space. The faculty worked together to write an initial proposal and then conduct a successful Self Study and External Review. We renegotiated all faculty contracts, and wrote a final proposal for the Council of Deans and the Board of Trustees. Being able to accomplish all of this required exceptional hard work, a commitment to excellence, creative problem solving, and perhaps most of all---resilience. Ultimately, we persevered and re-established our department on July 1, 2019. What can be learned from our experience by other departments is that culture matters as we strive to keep and improve our academic units.