Board of Trustees Update, Oct. 7, 2024

College Community:

The Harvey Mudd College Board of Trustees held its September meeting on Friday and Saturday, Sept. 27–28. Several trustees also were on campus Thursday, Sept. 26, to celebrate the accomplishments of our students during the Summer Research and Scholarship Poster Celebration. We enjoyed opportunities to meet with students, faculty and staff throughout our time on campus.

On Friday morning, the board welcomed representatives from the College’s Task Force on Clinic and Corporate Partnerships. Co-chairs of the task force Karl Haushalter, Seeley Wintersmith Mudd Professor of Chemistry and Biology and chemistry department chair, and Talithia Williams, professor of mathematics and mathematics clinic director were joined by Erika Dyson, associate professor of religious studies and Willard W. Keith Jr. Fellow in the Humanities, to lead a conversation with trustees about the first interim report of the task force. 

The task force has been meeting with various constituent groups of the College to share details of their findings thus far and gather input and feedback through a series of events and office hours for students, alumni, faculty and staff. If you have additional thoughts to share, we encourage you to reach out to the task force via their email address. On behalf of the trustees, we thank the members of the task force for their important work in envisioning the future for these critical partnership programs, and we look forward to receiving their final report and recommendations during our meeting next January. 

Saturday’s plenary session featured an update from President Harriet Nembhard and Dean of the Faculty Tom Donnelly on the strategic plan as well as exciting details surrounding the launch of the College’s first Innovation Accelerator. The Innovation Accelerator will provide up to $1,080,000 in internal grant funding for bold, forward-thinking initiatives by faculty and staff that drive innovation and excellence as part of our strategic plan. Details on the Innovation Accelerator, along with the most recent draft of the strategic plan, are available on the College’s website. 

During the board’s discussions Saturday morning, we heard updates from President Nembhard and Vice Chair of the Board Laura Larson on the College’s efforts to advance inclusion, diversity, equity and access this year. As a reminder, in December 2020 the board shared four goals around DEI. Those included:

• diversifying the board by actively recruiting people of color;
• continuing to support the College’s efforts to lead the national discussion regarding DEI in STEM;
• ensuring the College has the resources to accomplish priority programming identified to further its goals for DEI; and
• discussing a summary of the DEI programs and progress each September.

Vice-chair Laura Larson shared that board diversity continues to be a challenge, particularly due to the natural rotation of board members in recent years during the presidential transition. Laura shared that the Board Affairs Committee planned to revisit issues around board recruitment as part of a broader approach to developing more diverse representation moving forward. She called on all board members to redouble efforts to recommend potential board candidates and to assist in helping build and strengthen the pipeline for new members. 

President Nembhard acknowledged that Harvey Mudd College has been a national leader for several years, making remarkable progress in diversifying its students, faculty and staff. She shared that the President’s Cabinet recently received an update on campus efforts from the College’s IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Access) Committee and that she had discussed with the group some of the work she and her colleagues had done through the National Academies to advance the conversation around equity in undergraduate STEM education. President Nembhard has encouraged HMC’s IDEA Committee to extend their thinking to broader themes around inclusion, belonging and support for all students as part of their ongoing efforts. 

In addition to these important conversations, the Board also made some key decisions and received important updates during our meetings, including:

Campus Improvements

• The Physical Plant and Campus Planning Committee (PPCPC) discussed efforts to further improve safety on campus, in particular, work by the College’s Faculty Safety Committee to solicit faculty and community requests for assistance and conduct laboratory safety walkthroughs. Trustees also discussed recent efforts to provide support to students, faculty and staff during times of poor air quality on campus caused by local wildfires. 
• The PPCPC learned about the completion of several projects this summer, including the completion of installation for the backup power generator to support ventilation and exhaust systems as well as critical equipment in the academic spaces in the Libra Complex; ongoing work to bring The Claremont Colleges Services’ power substation into compliance with requirements for Southern California Edison’s Base-Interruptible Program (BIP) to again lower the College’s cost per kWh; completion of the exterior walkways waterproofing at Drinkward Residence Hall; duct cleaning in the Jacobs/Keck buildings; cleaning of air ducts in Sprague; and the first phase of the renovations to the Green Room located in the  Platt Campus Center. 
• The PPCPC received updates on several projects scheduled to be completed during winter break 2025. These include replacement of the Case Residence Hall power transformer and the two rooftop air conditioning units (pending timely receipt of the necessary equipment) that serve the Linde Activities Center, as well as the Central Plant Building automation controls.  
• Joseph Vaughan, vice president of computing and information services and chief information officer, updated members of the PPCPC on the completion of AV projects in the R. Michael Shanahan Center for Teaching and Learning, rewiring and upgrades to WiFi in Case Residence Hall, the outcomes of a TCC-wide cybersecurity assessment and developments in high performance computing at The Claremont Colleges.

Trustee Actions

• The board voted to approve the nomination of Christopher F. Lee, senior partner with Farron, Augustine & Alexander (FAA Investments), which specializes in real estate, hedge funds and private equity managers. He completed the Advancement Management Program at Harvard University and earned his MBA and B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from University of California, Berkeley. We thank him for his willingness to join the board and look forward to welcoming him to our next meeting. 

In closing, on behalf of the trustees, I want to thank each of our staff and faculty members for their ongoing work and dedication to ensuring our students’ success. We realize that these are challenging times to work in higher education. Please know that the work we are doing together as a community on behalf of our students has never been more important. We look forward to continuing to explore how, together, we can achieve our shared vision of “STEM for A Better World.”   

Sincerely,

Jim Bean ’77

Chair, Harvey Mudd College Board of Trustees