About UCEA

President's Letter

Together We Have Accomplished Much

UCEA InFocus, March 2008 (PDF)
Richard Novak, UCEA President 2007-2008

It’s amazing how quickly the year as UCEA President passes. While it is a large effort, it is exciting, enlightening and affirming to gain a broad-based, inside look at our profession and to serve such creative and dedicated members. Together we are touching millions of lives each year, helping to advance careers, meet societal demands for knowledge workers, positively contribute to the growth of regional economic development and extend global literacy.

A year ago, as I began my term as President, I presented a prospectus on priorities for the year, acknowledging that these would be collaborative activities, building upon the work of those who have gone before me as President and dependent upon the cooperation of the leadership of UCEA.

And now, a year later, I believe the retrospective view is a cheery one. Here are but a few highlights of what we have, together, accomplished this year:

• We have initiated a state of the art professional networking portal, UCEA Connect. If you have not yet registered, you are missing out on our social and professional networking portal that enables members to connect with each other, collaborate on projects or committee assignments, and access a wide variety of UCEA resources in an easy-to-use format. For example, you can download presentations and read summaries of sessions from the 2008 UCEA Marketing Seminar in San Diego, and download the 2007 professional member survey summary.

• We held another successful Executive Leadership Academy as we have sought to walk the talk, taking the challenge to lead seriously and our own continuing professional education just as seriously. This summer we will have the first Academy Alumni Forum with graduates of the Academy.

• On the international front, approximately 55 of our members, representing 35 institutions, traveled to Beijing, China, to meet with an equivalent number of colleagues there for the purposes of building relationships, expanding our knowledge base and discussing partnering on a wide variety of programs. Global Associates, a UCEA Knowledge Network, extended this trip with a visit to Shanghai and a series of meetings with key officials there.

• One of the most exciting developments of the year, coming to fruition and unveiled at the Annual Conference, is the national Advocacy Campaign, addressing workforce education, economic development and cross-cultural understanding. The Advocacy Campaign will also be able to leverage resources developed by another successful program, our research initiative on degree completion funded by the Lumina Foundation.

• Sharon Fross and her dynamic Annual Conference planning committee have led us on a series of firsts, including the first community service project as a conference prelude and the first blogging about and from a national conference. Thank you for a terrific conference and the many “firsts.”

I am, likewise, grateful to all of my colleagues who helped to make it a great year and make the burden light by serving on the Board, Committees, Commissions, Communities of Practice and in key leadership roles in the regions. Thank you.

Special thanks go to Kay Kohl and the staff of the Washington office for their yeoman efforts in making it all happen. Together we accomplish much more than we should. I offer special thanks and deep appreciation to John Hager, who is leaving UCEA to pursue some new dreams, after more than two decades of service to UCEA. He will be deeply missed.

Finally, it has been my privilege to work closely with two outstanding individuals, namely Barbara Scott, past president and Bob Wiltenburg, incoming President. What a joy to spend time and work with both of them! The future of UCEA is indeed bright with Bob as President and his very able successor, Pat Book, as President-Elect.

It has been my pleasure and a great honor to serve as your President this year. Thank you for the opportunity. Be well.