Dear alumni,

Gary Kuleck

It is a distinct honor to be selected as the new dean of the College of Engineering & Science (CES) beginning in this fall term 2012.  I am joining University of Detroit Mercy (UDM) after serving as associate dean and faculty member in the College of Science and Engineering at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, also a Catholic, Jesuit University. I was attracted to UDM and CES for a number of reasons, beginning with the Jesuit and Mercy tradition of promoting a student's intellectual, spiritual and ethical development in a diverse, intercultural, and urban community.  This tradition is at the core of how we define ourselves in our University and College and, in turn, characterizes the spirit of the alumni that graduate from UDM to successful careers in engineering and the sciences.

As I have truly begun to know the institution in the last few months, I have been struck by the passion of our faculty for teaching and scholarship and especially for their dedicated engagement with the undergraduates and graduate students in the College. This dedication is reflected in the recent U.S. News and World Report ranking that places our undergraduate engineering program in the Top 100 nationally as well as in the Engineering Centennial celebration last year. Our achievements as a College are due in no small part to the faculty commitment to the development of our students.

I have also been impressed by the deep commitment of our alumni to the University and College.  Our alumni embody the College mission, "Envision a Better World, Then Create It."  I am grateful of the alumni for their continued financial support, for their service to the College in recruitment and community outreach efforts, for their work on various departmental and college level advisory boards, and in their willingness to work with us in connecting to external partners.  I look forward to engaging and working with alumni in the years ahead.

As I work to complete a strategic analysis of our College in the next several months, I can see challenges and opportunities in the immediate future.  First, we will need to work to increase our recruitment of new engineering students as the economy continues a slow recovery and the demand for engineering talent is also rising.  We have outstanding, innovative programs in engineering and a concerted effort should lead to increased enrollment without sacrificing the high caliber of our current students.  The activities of alumni in the recruiting process has been pivotal and we will continue to seek alumni involvement in the process.

Second, we need to improve the infrastructure in our College to continue to support faculty teaching, scholarship and student engagement.  A paradigm exists in the recently completed first phase of the Chemistry Building renovation, which I encourage you to visit if you haven't done so already.  Infrastructural improvement in classroom facilities, laboratories and equipment is critical to training our students for professional careers and providing both undergraduates and graduates with career-enhancing research experiences.  We will devise a gradual, incremental plan across the College, in engineering and in science, to improve the infrastructure necessary in the very competitive educational world.

The opportunities for continued success in our College in the years ahead are abundant and I will elaborate on them in the months ahead.  We have a great foundation on which to build including the tireless efforts of my predecessor as dean, Leo Hanifin, who has helped to shape this foundation through his 21 years of service in that role.  I am grateful to Leo's efforts and all that contributed.  As a new dean in the College, I will continue to reach out to our dedicated alumni and external partners to work with us as we build and shape the future of our College. We remain dedicated to our mission of serving local, national and global communities through the advancement of knowledge and the education of professional engineers, scientists and mathematicians.

Best wishes,

Gary Kuleck
Dean, College of Engineering & Science