Grading the administrators: Dean Feniosky Peña-Mora

Columbia College Dean Michele Moody-Adams, School of Engineering and Applied Science Dean Feniosky Peña-Mora, and Provost Claude Steele have all been at Columbia for at least a full year. This week, the Editorial Board, after speaking to administrators, professors, alumni, and students, will offer our evaluation of their first years and what we hope to see from them in the years to come.

School of Engineering and Applied Science Dean Feniosky Peña-Mora, former associate provost of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, is full of energy, enthusiasm, and unconventionality. When was the last time we saw a dean bounding down the stairs of Havemeyer 309, arms in the air, for a photo shoot?

When asked in an interview to define his three main goals, Dean Peña-Mora responded that he is primarily interested in finding and keeping talented faculty, molding students into socially responsible leaders in scientific fields, and further developing the physical space on campus that is allotted to SEAS. All three of these goals work toward a larger aim. Dean Peña-Mora has set out to improve the standing of SEAS within the University, among professors and students, with respect to other engineering schools, and in the world at large.

The place of SEAS within the University is complicated. Columbia University is often associated most with Columbia College, and SEAS, which is pre-professional in nature, is sometimes overlooked or bypassed when considering what is best for Columbia and its (primarily liberal arts-focused) undergraduates. This can prove problematic for SEAS, which needs to be better incorporated into the policy-making process, particularly when one considers how many non-SEAS courses engineering students are required to take. The SEAS dean should be included in all administrative decisions, even those that may not directly affect engineering students, without sacrificing his own independence or that of his school.

That is why we are pleased that Dean Peña-Mora is so committed to improving SEAS’s stature within the University. For example, while he appreciates that SEAS students take the Core, he intends to look further into how engineering courses could be incorporated into the Core for students in Columbia College. This is particularly challenging given the negative response most students have had to Frontiers of Science. Furthermore, rather than seeing SEAS as linked solely to Columbia College and isolated from the rest of the University, Dean Peña-Mora and the rest of the SEAS administration have begun to work closely with Barnard, as well. Barnard students were already allowed to participate in SEAS’s five-year B.A./M.S. program, but now, more women are being encouraged to take advantage of this opportunity. One professor, Anthony Webster, has begun teaching a course at Barnard for both Barnard and SEAS students.

Linking the interests of the University and its many bureaucratic parts to those of SEAS students may prove more challenging. Dean Peña-Mora is still working with the Engineering Student Council, for example, to get the Center for Career Education to better address the needs of engineering students, and he is still trying to build alumni networks that cater specifically to SEAS graduates. While he has certainly taken steps in the right direction—for example, Boeing Week came about after Dean Peña-Mora spoke directly to the corporation’s CEO—there is still a long way to go. Dean Peña-Mora is right to seek a position at the University’s decision-making table, but the full measure of his success will be determined by whether SEAS students have a voice in all of the various offices meant to serve Columbia undergraduates.

That being said, it’s not only within the University that SEAS needs greater stature. Simply put, the School of Engineering and Applied Science does not have the same prestige as other top engineering schools. We are gratified by Dean Peña-Mora’s efforts to promote SEAS within the national and international academic communities while keeping the school itself as small as possible. Dean Peña-Mora has made progress toward this end that was previously thought impossible. He managed to secure 10 endowed chairs on Oct. 10, a goal that some trustees eyed with skepticism before it was achieved. He met the goals of the Capital Campaign, which had previously been struggling, in just one year, thus allowing for these goals to be increased and the school’s aspirations pushed higher.

All of these efforts contribute to “SEAS 20/20,” an initiative that aims to improve SEAS’s standing in the eyes of alumni, prospective students, and other academics and administrators. It is this initiative—simultaneously detailed, pragmatic, and visionary—to which Dean Peña-Mora has dedicated himself wholeheartedly—and, thus far, successfully.

There is, however, always room for further success, and this is particularly true when it comes to the relationship between SEAS and the wider world. Dean Peña-Mora’s efforts, generally speaking, work toward University President Lee Bollinger’s vision for a more global university. Certainly, a universal focus is also in line with SEAS’s fundamental purpose. Dean Peña-Mora has said that SEAS students will be the leaders of tomorrow’s scientific world—one that will desperately need bright, well educated, enthusiastic young people to improve underdeveloped areas. However, in spite of Dean Peña-Mora’s ongoing collaboration with the University’s global centers in Amman, Jordan, and Mumbai, India, his extensive travel abroad, and his intellectual support for practical engagement across the globe, there are not yet many ways for SEAS undergraduates to take advantage of Columbia’s ever-increasing globalization. If Dean Peña-Mora wants to improve SEAS’s national and international image, and if he believes his school’s students really are the leaders of tomorrow, he must continue to look for ways to better coordinate the efforts of the University’s global branches with SEAS and its undergraduates, and to more effectively encourage engineering students to study abroad, which is another ongoing initiative.

Ultimately, it will be the interest and passion of those students—both abroad and at home, in engineering and all other fields—that determine Dean Peña-Mora’s true success. He has raised money, put chairs in place, traveled the world, and brought prospective students to tears, but perhaps most notable is the new life and enthusiasm he has brought to SEAS. Dean Peña-Mora is fiercely proud of his school. But stop by any of his events with students (like last semester’s senior dinner, where guests received SEAS ties and scarves) and witness something truly surprising: His enthusiasm is starting to spread. SEAS is a unique institution on campus, across the country, and in the world. We congratulate Dean Peña-Mora on beginning to bring that message to every corner of the globe, but we also applaud him for reintroducing it to administrators, faculty, and students on this campus.