Dear Rutgers Students:

Welcome, new students, and welcome back, returning students! We are glad you are here at Rutgers, and we wish you a rewarding experience as you begin the fall semester.

I want to highlight a few of the newest developments on the New Brunswick Campus.

• Three "Signature Courses" on the topics of climate, extinction, and war will make their debut in the School of Arts and Sciences (SAS) this fall. Signature courses, which will become part of the SAS core curriculum, offer multidisciplinary approaches to 21st-century global questions with which Rutgers is grappling as a research university. Follow the link on the SAS homepage (www.sas.rutgers.edu) to learn more.
   
• The Student Counseling Center on Senior Street will be opening after classes start. Also opening this semester is the renovated front of the Livingston Student Center, which will include a new convenience store and café facilities; the remainder of the building will open in January. New meeting rooms have been completed on the third floor of Brower Commons.
   
• We will soon launch a newly overhauled university website, with the goal of making it more useful and navigable, especially for people who are new to Rutgers. A test site has been created, and I invite you to visit http://ur.rutgers.edu/redesign and let us know what you think.
   
• Among our new faces on campus, Thomas Farris begins his first semester as dean of the School of Engineering. Welcome, Tom!

To our newest students, I again welcome you to Rutgers and encourage you to take advantage of the wealth of opportunities available to you, both in and outside the classroom. To our returning students, I hope that you had a productive and enjoyable summer and that you will have an especially successful year.

One final note: I will present my Annual Address to the University Community on Friday, September 25, at 1:10 p.m. in the Rutgers Student Center on College Avenue. Following my remarks, I will take questions from the audience and from those sent in by email. You are welcome to attend the address or see the webcast via my website, www.president.rutgers.edu.

Richard L. McCormick
President
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey