hey everybody um my name is Mike Grove I'm the department head for biological
sciences
uh so obviously this session here for
accepted students in biological sciences
so we'll spend the time basically as
much time as you would like um
going over some concepts in terms of
how the major looks and then there's
some questions
that you have so there is a question and
answer
box there that you can type your
questions into and we'll try and get to
those
a lot of those we'll either do
here in terms of me or one of the other
faculty that will be joining us we'll
give you answers to those
for other ones we may just be typing the
answers in
into the box um
as we go so I just wanted to give you a
bit
of background let me share the screen
here
okay so just kind of give you a very
quick overview
to the department and to the majors that
we offer
obviously biological sciences if you
don't get your questions answered today
um here are the here's the contact
information for
the various faculty that will be helping
out here so
my name as I said I'm Mike Grove  so
that's my email it's
very easy just grove@rowan.edu
Dr. Spielman is here Dr. Greg Eaton as
well so they're going to be
uh answering questions we'll be taking
turns as we as we go through this but i
just want to kind of
give you an overview to things because
that may answer some of the questions
that you have
before you type them in so the bs in
biology
it's laid out here on this particular
slide
so it's a actually a four semester intro
sequence
so the first course that students take
is going to be an introduction
to evolution and scientific inquiry
course so we think that this lays the
groundwork for everything that we do in
biology it's all
explained ultimately we would argue by
evolution
as a theory you would then progress to
introduction genetics
uh introduction to cell biology and then
introduction to ecology in your
sophomore year so those four courses are
kind of again the introductory sequence
in place of a more traditional bio one
and two sequence
we think these cover four of the really five
key
broad areas of biology the other being
sort of anatomy and physiology
organismal biology and there are ways of
getting that
at other places in the curriculum so we
wanna
make sure that you come out of those
first two years with a good
foundation in in the basics
there are 19 hours of biology electives
that are required
uh for the upper level electives those
can be anything that we offer that are
you know in that upper level category
this is where you can specialize so we
really want to get you the foundation in
the first two years and then your junior
and senior year is where you're going to
really kind of specialize
in the direction that you want to go so
if you're interested in medicine or the
health professions which i know a lot of
you are
this is where you would take courses
such as introduction to biochemistry
developmental biology and advanced
genetics course things like
that if you're interested in something
more ecological
environmental science in flavor
for the upper level electives you would
you could take courses such as
environmental science conservation
biology advanced ecology
climate change biology so there are
certainly courses that fit into
various uh career pathways
in terms of what would be good
preparation so the junior and senior
year is really where you're going to be
taking those courses
we along the way require that you take
some associated science courses so two
semesters of inorganic chemistry and two
semester
semesters of organic chemistry and we
require two semesters of physics as well
required to take calculus one and then
finally a biometry or it's a
biostatistics course biometry is just
the name that we've given or the math
department has given that
but it's basically a biostatistics course
um if you don't if you notice those
courses are in many ways
the same foundational coursework that
would be required
for admissions into many health
professions programs
the vast majority of of med schools
pharmacy schools nursing schools et
cetera
are going to require that you have intro
biology sequence an intro chem sequence
often an organic chemistry sequence and
physics
things like that so by doing the bs in
biology you've really covered the basic
sciences that are going to be required
for the most part
um for the admissions requirements for
any of the health professional schools
you're also going to take some gen ed
type courses so
the university requires that you take
nine credits of communicative literacy
so that's going to be your comp one and
comp two courses that you take probably
your freshman year
and public speaking um there's a
scientific literacy requirement which is
satisfied for
for the bio major by chem one or
intro to evolution
quantitative literacy is satisfied by
calc one the humanistic literacy is
actually satisfied for bio majors by
taking philosophy of science or
philosophy of medicine
we really want you to have a philosophy
course because we think it's good
to kind of step back outside of the
discipline and think about it
from an outside perspective what is it
that we do in the sciences how do we
answer questions how do we deal with the
nature of truth
and in issues such as that and that's
really going to be
best done we think by having a good
grounding in
the philosophy of science then you're
also going to be required to take a
an artistic literacy course and a global
literacy course both of those are going
to be
completely elective in terms of which
course it is
there's going to be a rowan seminar
requirement that's going to be for
bio majors satisfied by intro to
evolution and that's going to really
introduce you to rowan and university
life so
many of the things we'll deal with in
that first course are not going to be
evolution content per se it's going to
be things like
how do i manage my time effectively
right so when you first come to
into a university setting you're coming
from a high school setting in which
things are
very much dictated to you um here your
time is going to be a lot more flexible
and you're also going to be
responsibility you have the
responsibility
for managing that time and being
independent in that way so we really
want to work
with you in terms of building some
skills in terms of how do i navigate
university life and so that's going to
happen in that rowan seminar course
as a first pass then you're also going
to be required to take a writing
intensive course that's satisfied by
philosophy of science so you don't need
to worry about that
and then finally a literature course
broadly based it's going to be often a
course
offered by the english department
sometimes by
uh say theater and dance department will
offer literature-based courses but
it's again a general education
requirement for the university
for those of you that are interested and
for those of you that's appropriate we
do offer a ba
as well in biology it's going to be very
similar in many respects
so i'm going to skip past this slide
pretty quickly and go to this slide
which does a comparison between the two
and the differences you'll notice are
highlighted in red or blue
so for the ba degree there is only
going to be a requirement of 12 hours of
upper level electives versus the 19
hours
for the bs degree so there's less
biology involved in the ba degree than
in the bs
degree for the ba
degree it is not required that you take
organic chemistry 1 and 2 so the courses
in red are courses that are required for
the bs but not for the ba
so the bs requires organic chemistry one
and two requires calculus and biometry
for the ba degree you can substitute
statistics one in
in the place of biometry and statistics
one does not have a calc one
prerequisite so you're not required to
take calculus
one for the ba my recommendation i think
the recommendation from the department
as a whole is
if you're interested in the sciences as
a career
so you're planning on graduating and say
going on to graduate a
graduate program in the sciences you are
interested in going on to a
program in the health professions so you
want to go to med school dental school
optometry school et cetera or you want
to come out you just want to get a
career
in a technical field in the sciences i
want to come out and be a lab technician
immediately with a bachelor's degree
which is a great
pathway for many students but in any of
those cases we would recommend that you
do the bs degree
right it's the much more mathematically
and scientifically rigorous degree
and you're going to be better prepared
for what comes next if you do that
the ba degree is really going to be more
appropriate for students that are doing
the science in addition to something
else so
the ba degree would be a good degree for
instance if you're interested
in doing science education so you
have the intention of being a high
school science teacher then the ba
degree is perfectly appropriate
if you want to say do science journalism
i want to write about science i don't
want to be a practicing scientist
per se i just want to write about
science
uh the ba degree would be a great degree
to do alongside of say a major
in uh journalism right or public
relations
i want to go to law school and do
environmental law
or genetic counseling again those sorts
of
fields would be really ideal
probably to do a ba degree in addition
to say a degree in law and justice or
some other major so
the ba is really the appropriate degree
when you're doing the science plus
something else
if you're really interested in the
sciences in any way shape or form
whether the sciences
in biology proper or the health
professions the bs degree is really
going to be the appropriate one to do
there are a number of student
organizations that help you with the
transition
to rowan and and throughout your four
years at rowan
this is not a complete listing but it's
uh you know
certainly a partial listing of some of
the the bigger clubs and more active
clubs
there is a biology club um a pre-health
club
the allied health there's the minority
association association of pre-medical
students
MEDLIFE neuro club WINGS
again incomplete listing but all these
organizations are going to
be ways in which you can make contact
with other students that have similar
interests
um obviously if you're attending
meetings for the pre-health club it's
probably because you're interested in
the health professions and the other
students there are
potentially as well almost all of these
clubs are going at various times hold
events
or bring in speakers that are related to
that particular
area of biology and the sciences for
instance the pre-health club will bring
in
say an admissions counselor from thomas
jefferson university say
in philadelphia many of our students are
interested in say
attending a physical therapy program
which
jefferson offers so that pre-health club
will bring in
an admissions officer from jefferson or
some other medical school say
and they will talk to our students about
what the admissions requirements are for
getting into that particular program or
other programs
in general but obviously they will talk
to you more specifically about their own
programs
we'll bring in other speakers that that
have careers
in the fields that you're interested in
we will use these meetings often or
these clubs will use these meetings as
opportunities
to hold workshops on how do i write an
effective resume and
the department as a whole will do this
as well so often the faculty will
hold these sessions
but these clubs will as well hold
sessions on effective resume writing
uh job interview skills those sorts of
things so we really want to build up
some
some career skills and and involvement
in these clubs is often a way to do that
they're going to provide you with
opportunities to do those sorts of
things throughout the four years
why come to rowan so we are
teaching you the classes as faculty
right all the classes are taught by
faculty both
lecture and the lab for the sciences so
you will get to know your instructors
right you're the faculty in the
department directly in class
we are we do not have a graduate program
in the biological sciences right now
that that may be in the offering within
a couple years
a master's program we are considering
developing a master's program
but that is not in place right now and
so we are entirely
dedicated to undergraduate education and
also undergraduate research any of the
research that we do
in the lab as scientists is going to be
done
with you as an undergraduate we don't
have a graduate program we're not
teaching
and training phd students and masters
students we're training you as an
undergraduate
those classes are going to be small in
size the lab classes
in science hall for biology are going to
be limited to no more than 26 students
that's the absolute maximum that we can
put in a room by fire code
so we're going to again get to know
you because the class size is going to
be very small
you're going to see us for both lecture
and lab and we're going to get to know
you and you're going to get to know us
which can be good or bad right it can be
very good because we're going to be able
to be a very good advocate for you
coming out of rowan when you are
applying for
med school or a job in in some career
field right we can very
often write you a very strong letter of
recommendation because we know you very
well having had you in class
potentially for multiple classes and
maybe the bad part of it is
you can't hide when you're not there we
know that you're not there
and there's a really we're building i
think a very strong advising and support
system
at rowan um part of this
uh process of advising is the Rowan
success network
and so we will put what are called flags
in and you'll get notification
from the advising staff uh on issues
such as
low test scores poor attendance things
like that so we're going to be able to
keep track of you and
in the net that's positive right
because we're really trying
to to make sure that you are making
progress towards graduation
in the way that that you want to and
that we want you to as well
we're really trying to integrate all the
sub disciplines in the curriculum as the
foundation as i mentioned before when we
kind of did the broad overview of
the the major we're really hitting on
all four
of those core courses because those are
really
the critical sub-disciplines in in in
biology as a whole so we're really
trying to
to give you the the big picture uh and
lay that foundation for everything that
comes after not just for the first job
to mention the the bureau of labor
statistics says now that the average
student coming out and college you're
going to change your job on average
10 times before you retire right so we
really want to train you
in a broadly based skill set
that's going to be useful for you
in every job that comes after not just
in the first job right you may come out
and you say okay
i want to come out and i want to be an
x-ray radiographic technician
great excellent do well in that but you
may not keep that job forever you may
decide to change
uh you may unfortunately sometimes be
downsized right as
as the market changes so we want you to
be ready for that and so
a lot of what we're going to try and do
is train you in these very basic
skills as well as in the content those
skills are going to be things like
communication can i communicate
effectively to other people
about what it is that i'm doing do i
have quantitative skills can i deal with
numbers and data right in in a real way
and and that's often going to involve
computational resources and things like
that and so we want to give you training
in those those skills we want to train
you
in how to think critically right what
is the kind of evidence that i use and
bring to bear on a scientific question
that's going to be very different
than it is in some other fields if i'm
in the arts or i'm you know in religion
studies there are standards of evidence
and there are ways of asking and
answering questions that are not
the same as they are in the sciences and
so we want to give you that skill set
for how to to address those issues um
as i said right undergraduate
participation faculty research is key
here right
we are involving you in our research
laboratories
often from day one it is not too early
to start thinking about
research as a freshman right i think
it's a great opportunity
your freshman year to start
learning the faculty learning what our
interests are
in terms of biology and what kinds of
research we're doing
and then potentially even by the end of
your freshman year being involved in
active research in somebody's lab
that would set you up you can do four
years of research then potentially
and you're going to come out with a
fantastic experience
um we've had undergraduates that have
been authors on publications coming out
of our labs
and it can be a really great experience
i think
and many times students want to
delay or they simply just don't know
better
delay getting involved in research until
the senior year and i would argue that's
actually almost
almost in many cases too late it's it's
very difficult for us to train you in
the techniques
used in the lab in a way that will allow
you to do any sort of meaningful
research before graduation comes up so i
would strongly recommend that you start
thinking about research very early on in
your career
as i said even as early as the freshman
year it's it's that is not too early
excuse me to to think about research um
involvement so the honors college this
says program here on this slide but it
actually is
now officially the Bantivoglio uh honors
college
at rowan we're expanding the offerings
there
we offer several of the intro courses as
honors offerings so intro to genetics
cell bio and ecology are offered as
honors versions
if you're a part of the honors college
um we're
probably going to be moving into
offering some of the upper level courses
for instance uh courses such as
microbiology where
we we offer multiple sections each
semester
um we're thinking about offering some of
those in an honors format
in the future as well so
here's the faculty you don't obviously have to
try and memorize this slide
i just really put this up here to to
give you an overview of the areas in
which
the the faculty are interested so as you
can see we have large
numbers of faculty interested in
genetics cellular and molecular biology
fields
um ecology and evolution organismal
biology so we have
faculty that have research interests in
all of the areas of biology and so if
you have an interest in biology
and biological research we have somebody
that
can probably guide you in that research
or in whose lab you can get involved
one of the last things i think i want to
say here is
making note of some of the off-campus
resources that we offer and programs
that we have
there are a number of exchange programs
that we have
formal relationships with and here are a
few of them
so the c semester program one of these
through Woods
Hole massachusetts
in this program students you spend six
weeks
on land learning in a classroom setting
things like
uh maritime law and the principles of
navigation using the stars things like
that marine biology
you know in a sort of more academic way
but then the last six weeks of the
program you're out at sea
on a sailing vessel you're learning you
sail and put those things into practice
so
12-week program and all those credits
transfer back into the program
here very directly so we've had a number
of students that have done it
i have never heard anyone come back and
say that was a bad thing to have done in
fact
it's exactly the opposite almost every
student that's done it has come back and
said that's the greatest thing i've done
it's a fantastic experience um
we also have an exchange
somewhat similar program
an exchange program with the university
of san Francisco in ecuador
and so what happens here is you spend a
semester
in the galapagos islands in large part
you do spend a couple weeks i think
initially uh in quito ecuador
when you first arrive on the mainland
but the bulk of the semester is spent on
the galapagos studying marine biology
marine sciences
in an island setting
it's a great opportunity if you're
interested in spanish you know as a
language or as a culture
they try to in this program house
students with
local families so it's a great
opportunity to kind of
learn some spanish if you don't know any
or bone up on your spanish if
if you've had some in high school so
that's
as well a really fantastic program and
again all those credits come back in
and transfer very directly
the new jersey science uh sorry new
jersey sea grant consortium
in sandy hook new jersey offers summer
courses
in areas such as marine sciences marine
biology
geology things like that so if you're
especially in north jersey in the summer
you can take courses directly there on
campus
in sandy hook and get credit for those
Rowan credit directly for those if
you're going to be here
more locally in Glassboro or the south
jersey region
probably not ideal for you it's a couple
hour drive but
if you're in the north jersey new york
area you might want to think about
doing some of the summer courses that
the sea grant consortium offers there
in sandy hook so and then there's an
education abroad center at rowan
that's uh can help you kind of design
programs or look at existing programs at
tons of other places we've had students
that have gone
abroad and studied at universities in
trying to think of some of the ones most
recently i've had students i've talked
to if they've gone to australia
new zealand we've had a student recently
go to germany to do work there at a
university there
so there's a number of places that we
have sent students
and the study abroad or education abroad
center can really help you there as well
and so we can get you in contact with
them if you have interest
in that and again all of those are going
to provide credit towards a Rowan
degree
if you have questions that don't get
answered today which we'll get to here
in one second
our homepage super easy rowan.edu/biology
and that's gonna have links to
things like the academic programs
uh research interests for the faculty
faculty web pages student organizations
you name it the vast bulk of it's going
to be there on the home page so
take a look there if you have not had a
chance to yet so
i'm gonna close this presentation
and get back and we'll start looking at
um
some of the questions that you have here
so i don't know whether
dr spielman or dr eden if you've had a
chance to be looking at the questions as
i've been kind of rambling on so if
there's anything you want to
tackle here in terms of uh answering
some questions asked
i think i've gotten most of the
questions that are in there so far
so if anybody wants to ask some new ones
go for it but i'm not sure i can take
this one
Mike do you wanna? which one is this
question what is biology 4010 was that
something from your slides
i'm not sure
um if you could clarify that
question further there may
have been a title on the slides uh we do
have a question
dr grove if you want to take this how
competitive is the department in terms
of admissions and then once you're in
the department
okay um
it is not really i think a question
for the department specifically i think
it's more a question of
rowan as a whole um rowan
we have become more selective in some
ways i think as a university uh over
time
there are this average student for
instance
high school gpa the average sat scores
things like that have
have increased um it is a it is a
competitive process
uh in terms of admissions but we are
also
a state university or it is our mission
to
educate the students of uh in the
population of new jersey right and so
we are we are a a broad access
public university in that sense we are
we're not as going to be as exclusive as
many other universities right
and once you get in once you're admitted
uh
into the major i
i don't want to say that we're
competitive at all in some sense
right and i guess it depends on what you
mean by competitive and so if you want
to clarify that um
we are interested i guess in having
everybody that is a biology major
succeed all right
we are a department now that
offers degrees we have
upwards of 1100 majors currently between
the bs and the ba degrees
um so it that's pretty broad access
right and we have been growing steadily
for the last
well as long as i've been here which is
19 years right every year where we're
a little larger and a little larger and a little
larger right so
we we are continuing i think on that
mission of providing education to those
students that are seeking it
um so if you if by competitive right
it's it's referring to a question of
you know difficult yeah um you know
we we are trying to offer a rigorous
program i mean it
i would not recommend you know the
sciences for somebody that is not
serious about
developing mathematical skills or
communication skills i think many
the joke and i don't think students
sometimes say it is a joke but students
will say to me
i like the sciences uh so i want to go
into biology because i like science but
i don't want to write and i don't want
to do math
right and i think that's a bad approach
um there's a lot of math that we're
going to require as courses so
certainly calculus and biometry at a
minimum for the bs
degree um writing is there in comp
it's in the upper level courses right
we're going to expect you and
obviously not expect you from scratch
we're going to help you develop skills
in writing and in quantitative thinking
right the sciences require both of those
pieces right
uh as a profession right no one is going
to take you seriously as a professional
scientist if you are
unable to communicate effectively in
writing or in oral form for that matter
right they're not going to take you
seriously if you're not
fluent right in terms of data management
and quantitative skills right
these are the things that you're going
to have to have to be a good practicing
scientist right and so in that sense
it's going to be it's going to be
rigorous right and there are going to be
high expectations
it's certainly not unachievable right
we're we're not trying
to intentionally flunk you out and there
are going to be
universities i you know i to be honest i
think
there are universities that will take
the approach often in the freshman year
let's make our courses as difficult as
possible with a goal
specifically of flunking out some
specific
proportion in the population and we only
want the very best of the students
remaining
after the first year of courses for
instance that is not where we're at
right we are interested in getting you
right a good education right and
we will help you get there right and
that's going to be building up skills
it may not be the right major for you
ultimately but we're not going to
intentionally try and get you out of the
program
um and so i guess you know competitive
can mean different things and
maybe on all of those there so anyways
hopefully that that helps if if that
doesn't answer the question obviously
feel free to
to post again and we can get back to it
um what other questions
stephanie's too quick she's answering
all the questions
um trying to think if there's anything
here we want to expand on
are there any opportunities for
scholarships in the biological sciences
program
i know the answer is yes but i don't
know the details
yeah we don't there are not really uh
scholarships aimed specifically at our
major or department
um there are sort of there are
yeah yeah it you take this
yeah i think i think that what i would
say at first pass is
right the scholarships that people are
going to be applying for are going to be
university-wide right so there
there are things externally i guess
maybe the
the way that i want to approach this is that
there are going to be external
scholarships that many people apply for
and there are going to be internal
scholarships right
much of the Rowan money is kind of
more generally targeted
right at rowan students in general right
so what your financial
needs are right um they're going to be
scholarships that are kind of
open for any rowan student to apply for
um there are going to be scholarships
that are a little more targeted
uh in some cases and then there are
obviously external scholarships in
in a lot of cases that are often very
specific right
uh particular foundations uh
organizations will have scholarships for
students that are
intending to pursue careers in very
specific fields such as biology so
um greg or stephanie did you want to add
something to that
there's also some some work study um
things that you can do in the department
specifically i know we
have we hire some lab techs for the
but then there's also i think you you
can get paid to be a tutor now that
would generally be your second year
but i think the tutor center uh pays as
well there's another
biological sciences specific work study
opportunities
yeah there are both federal and internal
work study
uh pools of money so the federal work
study you know
both or there are certain eligibility
standards federal work study as the name
says comes from
federal funding um internal money comes
as you might expect from internal rowan
funds right that are specific to the
university
um as dr eden was saying those you can
be paid through those for work in a prep
lab saying in the department
but also for instance doing things like
tutoring
uh working at the rec center there are
there are a number of jobs on campus
that you could
uh have work study money for that would
be outside of the department proper
but you know you would still be a
biology major but say getting internal
work study money for working at the rec
center
or in the library or various places like
that so
there are a number of funding sources
certainly that can that can help
with the cost of the education
absolutely
here's another question here are there
programs or extracurriculars that
high school students can participate in
to increase their chances of being
accepted into rowan there's
i think that's a question that the
admissions department
may be able to answer a little bit
better than me but
something to say there yeah it's i think
again it's
this is probably not the best question
for us to answer
in terms of the biology major or
department specifically because the
admissions process is really run very
centrally through the admissions office
as a department we actually have very
little to do with which students are
accepted actually
by very little i mean almost nothing to
be honest um
we kind of say okay here here are the
courses that we want to offer students
and and
these are things that students need to
be prepared for but we
ultimately do not make any of the
decisions in terms of accepting students
that's done for us
by the admissions office they're making
the decisions in terms of
how many majors can be supported in each
department
and and what the standards are we really
get a list
at some point you know of kind of like
here are the incoming freshmen
um and and we're working from that we're
really not
involved in the admissions process so i
think that's really
a better question unfortunately for the
admissions office i might
defer you to to ask somebody
in that office
so the question here about the honors
college um
there is actually an admissions process
for that
uh as well so when you come in as a
freshman
um i think there are some students that
are admitted directly
into the program but you can also
once you're admitted and come as a
freshman there is always a chance to
gain later admissions into the honors
college
i think as part of that process it has
changed i think i have not been involved
directly on the honors board um
but i think what happens is that you
fill out
some information and there are a couple
of essays that they require
it's there's certainly a gpa requirement
in terms of high school or your current
college gpa
for that it's
it's a fairly standard admissions
process but again that's
i think it's something i might defer you
to uh
somebody from the honors college if you
want to write me um
who is it that was asking this question
um
i'm not seeing the name here
i'm having trouble flipping back to this question
sorry so if you asked the question about
the honors admissions to that
send me an email again my email is easy
just grove@rowan.edu
i can put you in direct
contact some of the people
in the honors college or on the honors
board and they can explain the
admissions process
for the honors college directly they
they're going to know way more about it
than i am
i think unfortunately we can help you
best with the things that are most
specific to our department obviously so
the question here is there anything
incoming freshmen should do over the
summer to prepare for the fall
um i think is an excellent question
i think my first response is enjoy your
summer
um you know that that transition from
high school to college is not going to
be easy right
um so so enjoying your summer this is
i'm not trying to be facetious here
right
um many of you are going to have jobs
uh summer jobs this summer is going to
be a little weird
or a lot weird in that sense obviously
uh given the
state of affairs with the coronavirus
that we're in
i think what i might say is
the preparation that you want to do is
committing yourself
to this right to hitting the ground
running uh
one of the things that often happens
with freshmen
is that you're coming in and you're
experiencing this condition that i often
call freedom horrible freedom
it's going to be new and different and
simultaneously exciting and probably
terrifying in certain ways
and part of that process is that you're
going to again as i
mentioned earlier in high school things
are often
depending on especially your high school
very regimented in terms of
all right i have to be at class at this
time and this time and this time and
the instructors are doing this and that
and the other thing in terms of
um kind of keeping track of things
we are keeping track of who you are and
where you're at and whether you're
attending class and turning things in
but we are not going to be
dictators right you are going to be
responsible ultimately
for showing up right for class
to be honest you're going to be
responsible for turning your work in on
time
right and i think there's going to be a
commitment here right that's going to
have to be made and that you're often
going to to see this
new college life as an opportunity to do
all sorts of things that you haven't
done before
and that can be a really great thing
right but it can also
and it happens a lot of times in that
first semester freshman experience
where you get so involved in these other
things right these extracurriculars
that the studying and the class work
sometimes can suffer
um and students will often not do as
well in that first semester as they do
later
because you're not coming in with that i
think mindset of being
kind of dedicated to the work into the
process
so i would really kind of recommend kind
of
gearing yourself up for hitting the
ground running in terms of
i'm going to make the best of this
opportunity from day one
right because it can it can be easy to
get yourself into trouble
that first semester if you're not
reasonably kind of prepared for the
workload which is going to be
significant right i i
shouldn't you know joke around about
this it's going to be a lot of work in
in a lot of these classes right you're
going to have heavy workloads
there's going to be heavy expectations
for studying outside of class
many of you will continue to have jobs
um as you as you take
classes and so you've you've really got
to be i think you know
dedicated to this um so that's
maybe not the answer that you're looking
for um
because i don't think academically
there's anything that i would say that
you know
don't it's there's no summer reading
assignment for instance or anything like
that
um but i think it's more kind of a
mentality that you want to develop of
i'm going to come in and i'm going to uh
make the best of my experience from the
beginning so
that's how i would answer that
question
are there any questions that you guys
have come across that might warrant some
longer explanation
i think i've got them all tiffany has been
answering all of these
there was early on a couple questions
about the pre-med
track i don't know if we expounded on
that at all
yeah do you want to tackle that or
sure um
a question that we often get is
is there a major for pre-meds and the
answer to that simply is no there is no
major for
pre-medical studies um
there's a couple majors that make sense
but it doesn't really matter what your
major is as long as you have a couple
as long as you have the prerequisites
that are necessary for medical school
a number of specific science classes and
other things
um you could be a history major and and
go to medical school
there are a couple majors at rowan that
that feed directly into pre-medical
studies so
biological sciences is the most popular
there's also uh molecular and cellular
biosciences
um sure there's a number of other
majors biobiochemistry is a very popular
one biochemistry exactly
so um really it's it's up to you and
what your plans are
after after graduating um and what your
what your interests are what degree you
want to get before going to medical
school
that is your track we do have sorry mike
wants to say something
sorry we do have uh
three advisors um that are
specifically for anyone at rowan who's
planning to go to medical school
after they they graduate so if if
you want to go to medical school you're
on the pre-med track you can choose your
major but you want to let them know that
you want to go to medical school so that
you can
you can get in touch with those advisors
and i think actually it's a good uh
place to pick that up in terms of i
don't know if there's a question in
there in terms of advising
um which may not be something that
students think about but just kind of an
explanation of how the advising process
works i think is is an important
consideration
we as a department we have three what
are we calling embedded professional
advisors
and so these are people that are going
to help shepherd you through the
academics
um these are the people that you want to
meet with
i would argue every semester that you're
at rowan
including the first semester as a
freshman and every semester thereafter
make an appointment with your
professional advisor
spend 10 or 15 minutes making sure that
you're on track towards graduation
their job is really to keep track of
your academic progress and help you
where
you run into stumbles with that they
they
will be up on all the newest courses
that are being offered in our department
or other related departments
so you really want to take advantage of
that
it's a horrible thing that happens on
occasion where we will have a student
that will come to spring of their senior
year and think they're ready to graduate
and they're not
and we often will talk with their
students and the way they have gotten
there is to have not
participated in the advising process
right they've tried to kind of
keep track of it entirely on their own
which you can do
don't get me wrong it's certainly
possible but there are
advisors there whose purpose is to help
shepherd you through those
so please take advantage of that
right every semester it'll cost you 15
minutes a semester maybe
and in the long run it may save you a
year of course work that you didn't know
you needed
right until it was almost too late so i
would strongly recommend that you take
advantage of the advising
you will be assigned an advisor as a
freshman and that's really based
entirely alphabetically so a through g i
think it is
lorenzo matthews will be your advisor i
think the students that are H through
maybe N i want to say uh patricia
daschefsky
and then for students that are um what
comes after n? o and above
um or later in the alphabet i think are
assigned to christina davidson tucci so
you will be assigned an advisor
as a freshman so if you do not have one
let us know maybe you didn't get one
assigned but
it's more likely that you just don't
know where to look to figure out who
your advisor is and so we can help you
out with that as well
um as dr eaton was saying there is also a
health professions advising team
so thomas varela was the health
professionals advisors just recently
left
unfortunately take another job we're
going to be in the process of hiring a
replacement
for him but um Dr. Deneen Hendrick is the
coordinator of health the health
professional studies so she
is a physician by training and their job
is going to be
to help you with that preparation for
admissions into health professions
programs
so it's kind of a two-tiered approach
right the the professional advisors that
are going to help you with the academics
for the undergraduate degree
specifically how do i graduate
in four years with a biology degree
whereas the health professions advising
staff
they're really going to be helping you
with the what kind of classes should i
be taking along the way that are going
to
prepare me best for admissions into med
school or dental school or any of the
other health professions
schools so there are going to be two
types of advising
and i would recommend you take advantage
of both obviously
as you proceed so i think one other
question that came up here i know
stephanie answered but it seems to be a
pretty common one so if people didn't
see it i might just
address in terms of that issue of double
majoring um because it was kind of
related
to that question of what major i should
do to
do pre-med and the question was can a
science major do a double major with a
subject under another department such as
women's studies was the specific
question
but i think in general the answer is yes
absolutely right
there's a lot of room still left even in
the bs degree
and even more so in the ba degree but
even the bs degree there are
what is it 12 hours of free electives
and
some number nine hours of non-program
electives i want to say off the top of
my head i'd have to don't
quote me on those numbers but um there's
there's a significant number of hours
that are not accounted for
in the science courses per se or other
requirements
and so that's where you can take those
courses that are in another department
and that you could do a double major
and as dr speilman i know put in her answer
we've had you know students
one of our best students um who just won
one of the departmental awards
was doing a double major in biology and
in music um
so there you go you know two two things
that you wouldn't necessarily put
together
in an obvious way um had students double
major
you know in uh i've had students i know
i've talked to
that double majored in biology and then
in spanish or biology and writing arts
you know you name it you can double
major in it i mean
and it's often a very interesting way to
kind of position yourself for
for a career if i want to say
do conservation biology as a career
and i'm interested in how do how do we
protect endangered species often those
species are not
you know in the us they're off in other
places right so i want to do
conservation work in south america for
instance
well having a major in spanish might
actually be a good thing you know
just saying to you know put alongside
that because you're probably working in
an environment in which spanish is the
the first language there so
there are all sorts of situations in
which a particular career
you know could really uh not require but
really be well suited to have a major in
in some field that sometimes you're not
even
thinking about so that's certainly
something i think talk with
the faculty or your advisors about as
you make progress
you know just because you come in with
only a bio major it's never too late
to declare a minor or a second major
or even change your majors um we would
love to have you in biology but as you
make progress through this if you decide
that something else
fits you better do that you know don't
stay in this field just because that's
where you started and i think sometimes
there's this inertia or some cost that
students view of well i started bio
biology
major i'm going to finish as a biology
major but i don't really like biology
well then don't do biology do the
spanish or the art major that you really
feel like is calling you so like i said
we would love to have you and help you
make progress towards a biology degree
but if something else is better for you
then
we can help you do that as well so
well so we got here
i think i just did a typing and i may
have responded to the wrong
one but regarding the question is bio
and computer science available to take
as a double degree my answer is
above you in the wrong place absolutely
you can double major in whatever you
want this is your path this is your
college experience
not mine i've had it you should major in
what
you feel is important to you um i also
am just realizing that so i also sent a
link there is a bioinformatics major
which does combine biology and computer
science to a certain degree
it's offered through the molecular and
cellular biosciences department and i'm
just realizing that the link to it that
i
sent does not work so let me try to
track down
a better bioinformatics link
here masters
there's actually well stephanie's
looking at that um there is a question
here
in terms of transfer students i know
some of you uh
many of our students often are transfer
students i often will
you know in an incoming class almost
half of our students will be transfer
students
at various levels of progress you know
in terms of freshman sophomore
uh or even beyond so i think the
question here was asking about how many
credits to take as a transfer student i
think i want to answer this
maybe a little more generally right um
dr spielman did answer this there saying
that
there is a rowan university requirement
to have 120 credits for graduation
um if you think about this if you're
coming in as a native freshman
say and then i'll get back to the
transfer students here in one second but
if you're coming as a native freshman
right
if you do the math right eight semesters
to get 120 credits
on average you need to have 15 hours
every semester if possible right um and
so there's this 15 to finish kind of
initiative i think
the university is running because we
really want you to be able to get out in
four years and it's absolutely possible
but if i only take 12 hours a semester
or even less and i'm
i'm only doing part-time then i'm not
going to be able to finish in four years
right
um for some of you that is still going
to be a necessity right and i'm not
trying to push
everybody into taking 15 hours a
semester right it may not be appropriate
for you and your individual situation
right
you may be working you have family
concerns you're
you can only take nine hours a semester
great do what you can do
right i'm not saying this is the right
answer for everybody
but if you can right taking that 15
hours on average
is going to give you a very timely
progress towards graduation in the four
years
um and the other thing too you might
want to think about right
rowan charges tuition by the credit hour
up to 12 hours
between 12 and 17 hours you do not pay
any more in tuition
right so once i'm at 12 hours right
if i take another class that same
semester you are not paying anything
else for
it right which is another reason not to
limit yourself to 12 hours you're going
to pay more in the long run by limiting
yourself to only 12 hours right
it's it's essentially we're giving away
classes between 12 and 17 hours right
once you get to 18 then it becomes again
per
credit hour per credit hour charge i
should say on
on that um but there is that magic kind
of sweet spot there between 12 and 17
hours where you're considered a
full-time student
you have the financial aid potentially
for being a full-time student and yet
you're not paying any more
uh to take those courses so certainly
again
work with your advisors to make sure you
have a full load each and every semester
if that's appropriate
if it's not again that's fine but i
think for
for the vast majority of you that's
going to help you
make progress towards graduation in a
way that's going to be useful for you so
just wanted to hit on that for transfer
students transfer students are
you're going to be all over the place in
terms of your needs and what you need to
finish
and so again this is going to sound like
a broken record but
talk to your advisors schedule an
advising appointment
the first day you get on campus you
won't be able to meet with your advisor
the first day on campus
but right sometime in that first month
or so
make sure that you have an appointment
with your advisor
and talk about registration for the
following semester
it's never too early in the semester to
be thinking about the future so
work with your advisors very carefully
in terms of what you specifically need
because each and every transfer student
is going to be a little different
based on where you're coming from what
classes you've transferred in
have you finished the associate's degree
if you finish the associate's
science or associate of arts degree you
are not required to finish the gen ed
requirements for instance you are
by state law considered as having
finished gen ed right and so there are
very few courses there that you would
need to take
right there they would only be some very
specific things which are known as rowan
experience requirements
so you're not going to have to take in
many cases anymore history or sociology
or things like that
unless you want to um you can you can
focus on these other
courses in the major and things like
that so make sure you know what your
status is as a transfer student and
again the best way of doing that is
talking with your advisors very directly
right and on a very regular basis
Dr Speilman has been extremely efficient answering
the questions here in the chat but
i was wondering if anything is worth
kind of highlighting for for everybody
well this question about yeah here is i
think a good question about how do you
join the biology club or pre-health club
or other clubs like that
dr speilman's answer i think is a very
good one simply show up for the meetings
um
these are all open right there's no
admissions requirements
there's no hazing that's going to go on
right there's no
uh you know nothing along those lines
you you might have to hold the snake if
you join biology
club though so depending where that
falls for you it could be hazing
yeah but um these these are the things
these are the sorts of things where it's
like you can absolutely
again from day one your freshman year
start taking advantage of
will we be in person on campus in the
fall uh
which is probably something we should
say something about here in one second
um
we don't know yet the state has yet to
decide
ultimately the university's decision on
that will be based on the state
level decision what the governor's
decision is in terms of higher education
or
the secondary schools
but let's for the sake of argument let's
pretend we're back on campus in the fall
it is not too early to start attending
meetings of these clubs the first day
that they
meet right your freshman year um
that's the way you get involved you you
can become a club officer by the time
you graduate
uh that's going to be often a
great thing to have on your resume to
show active involvement in these
extracurriculars
it's not just that i've showed up to
class and gotten straight a's
lots of people can do that if you put
enough work into it
if that's all you do uh but being
successful in terms of grades while simultaneously
doing these other things such as being
an active
participant in biology club and doing
research and
you know all these things simultaneously
uh
that's going to be part of this process
of showing that you're capable of doing
good work and
you know it's it's showing that you can
manage time effectively it's showing
that you have a dedication to these
tasks
um so i i think again thinking about how
you can get involved from day one is
is key here though just making sure that
you take advantage of the opportunities
that are there
there are always going to be things out
there that you don't know about
colleges i think the more even
i work at one the more amazed i am at
the resources that are
available that even 20 years
after i started working here i'm still
kind of myself finding out oh
we have that club on campus um one of
the best ways of
of looking at that for clubs for
instance there is a proflink site
um that we can send you the link to
which
lists all the clubs um and has links to
so what their kind of
um i don't want to say goals but what
their kind of
um interests are i guess maybe is the
better way of saying it you know
so we're going to have so dr eden for
instance you have uh
it's the what's the love your melon
right
club yeah love your melon at rowan
university it's a
pediatric cancer um
that's the the focus is on pediatric
cancer but it's a
clothing brand they make beanies and the
the goal is to get a beanie on the head
of everyone with
pediatric cancer so you can you can buy
beanies to support them and then they
they donate beanies to pediatric cancer
patients
yeah so there's an example of one that
you know again i would have never
known of if i didn't have this contact
in dr eaton right that exists so
there are lots of things out there for
you to get involved in um
and also oh
at the beginning of the semester we
usually do a big you know
everyone come attend event in the main
hallway of our building for the
biology club where all the faculty who
are free during the time that it's
scheduled
can come introduce themselves explain
what classes we teach what our research
interests are if we do research
in our positions and then lots and lots
of students are there and you can it's
kind of
it's a really it's a nice meet and greet
so
um when you're first you know getting
started and first coming onto campus it
it's a lot less overwhelming that way
there's a big meeting everybody's there
it's you know nobody's looking at you
specifically there's a lot of freshmen
um very well attended so there's a way
to kind of get in the door without
having to you know feel nervous about
oh if i go to this meeting and nobody
knows me and i'm all alone no
everybody's there it's
an event um there is a question here
actually
and it kind of started touching on this
when we were answering this last
question
uh but but abita had a question she just
posted and i think this is the
big one that um has probably
in everybody's mind how are classes
being taught right now considering the
current circumstances
the answer is right now as of this
particular
minute right uh everything that rowan is
doing is
being offered online so all the summer
courses are going to be
online right for their full term
um if you're if you're taking a summer
class here it is being conducted
remotely or virtually right there there
are no in-person summer classes being
offered this summer
for the fall i think is probably where
the the question is really getting at
right and if you're coming as a freshman
um i'm sure this is not an easy thing to
to be thinking about right
but but i have to be honest the answer
is right now we don't know exactly for
sure how this is going to play out right
i think there are a number of ways it
could play out
uh one of those is that the state
decides that it is still too risky
to have people on campus in classes of
any significant size
um or in dorms you know interacting too
much
and they say everything still needs to
be remote it is
it is a distinct possibility that the
classes that rowan
or any of the other state schools
rutgers montclair state you name it
uh we will almost certainly all be in
the same situation right
the state may simply say to us you
cannot offer classes in person
right um we are preparing for that
eventuality
right everything that we are we are
doing uh is
is preparing for anything to happen
right
we understand fully that it can go a
number of anyways
right it can go entirely remote right
there is the possibility that we'll be
back in person right and that will be
able to have full
size classes and everything will be
great and this
you know virus disappears um and it's
business as usual it seems unlikely
um so you know i i can't promise that
um because it that's not the way these
diseases
right and and the progression of these
diseases usually works
but you know if it happens great we
would love to see you on campus
um there is the possibility that we will
be offering campus
offering campuses sorry having trouble
talking today for some reason
um offering classes in a reduced
capacity format
right and so the students that want to
be on campus
and can be on campus are able to still
be here but that we offer classes that
are
reduced in size from what we would
normally right so for instance in
biology
right the vast majority of our classes
are going to be 24 to 26 students right
because that's the way our rooms are
designed and that's both lecture again
and lab
right so you're going to have the same
instruction for for lecture and
for lab same room 24 is 26 students
right
it may be the case where the state comes
to us and says
you can only have half that number in a
particular classroom
because you have to maintain these
export special distancing
guidelines that everybody's gotten used
to and
we don't yet have a a real handle on how
many
people then we could do in the classroom
but say for the sake of argument it's
12 right instead of the usual 24
what we have to do is say okay half of
you can be inclined
you know at the regular scheduled time
on monday at 11 a.m
and the other half of the class will
show up on wednesday at 11 a.m
and for those 12 of you that are not in
class on a particular day we have other
assignments you have
you have a narrated powerpoint or
we are simulcasting right or we're
streaming
the the class lecture as it goes on
for the one that you're not at and we
record that
um and we have outside assignments for
you to do and that we're kind of
swapping students in and out
um as we go over the course of the week
so that everybody has a chance if they
if they want to be in class physically
right
we have i think gotten already
a lot of experience at doing these
things remotely
the spring semester as you might imagine
we were
right it was right around spring break
when this really kind of
became of concern as we went on break
the university said to all the faculty
across all the various departments
get ready to teach classes remotely if
necessary after spring break
we're going to delay opening back up for
a week
and they made the decision in that
two-week period that we were not coming
back at all so everything in the spring
semester finished remotely there were no
in-person classes
at the end of the spring semester so
everybody that was teaching in the
spring semester
got some kind of on-the-job training in
teaching remotely
um i don't know that i could say that it
was the greatest
job in the world not to denigrate the
efforts that everybody made because i
think everybody both faculty and
students and staff
put a lot of work into making that
happen but as you might expect
doing that over two weeks is not ideal
right people were kind of having to do
things pretty quickly right in ways that
they were not previously prepared for
we will be much better prepared for the
fall no matter how it looks
if it again is entirely in person great
it's business as usual
we know how to do that but if it's
remote or if it's
half remote and half live we have now
gotten some experience in doing that
and i think the experience that you're
going to get as a result as a student
is going to be significantly different
than what was happening for students in
the spring
people are going to be much better uh
prepared for that and
so it's not look nobody's nobody's going
to be happy about it
it's not what anybody wants or desires
you wanted to come to college i'm sure
in
the vast majority of the cases because
you want to interact with other students
with
faculty with the staff have those
in-person experiences in terms of going
to class
and going to football games and being
able to use the rec center
and hanging out on friday night with
your friends in the dorm
and we would love for you to have that
experience
uh this fall semester but it
it may or may not happen we just we just
do not know yet
um the thought is that the state will be
making those decisions hopefully
sometime in early june
um that's not a hard fast deadline but
that's kind of what we've been hearing
or i've been hearing at least
um so we may have a better handle on
this by the middle of june say in terms
of what classes are going to look like
but that even that is not a promise
these things can still be
you know developing and again even if we
start in person say in the fall there's
nothing that says that we don't get a
second wave of this
um pandemic sweeping through and we're
right back to remote in the middle of
the semester again so
everybody's going to be ready for
everything and that's unfortunately the
best we're going to be able to
offer you which not ideal
not what anybody wants but that's the
world we're living in right now so
sorry it's not uh not where we want to
be either as teachers we would really
love to be in the classroom with you
uh in the fall but we'll see what
happens so
anything else that we want to hit on
everybody's still there i think almost
everybody that joined us at the
beginning is still there so
i'm assuming that if you're still here
you're still interested in what we have
to say
so uh we'll keep talking if you still
want to keep listening
but um are there questions that are kind
of of general interest here that we want
to hit on again
i think this is actually something
that's that's worth talking about so uh
uh maybel  asked this question here can
you elaborate a little bit about cooper
medical school of rowan university
um and i might just kind of throw the
school of osteopathic medicine in there
as well which dr eaton did
so in the in the question and answers uh
dr eaton already kind of addressed this
but i think this is something that's
probably of interest to a lot of the
students so i'm
just going to say it more broadly to
everybody in case you're listening to me
and not looking at the q&a
for questions and answers
um rowan does have in fact we have two
medical schools that are affiliated
as part of the system right so there is
the cooper medical school of rowan
university
which is in camden and that's a more
traditional
um allopathic medical school then there
is the school of osteopathic medicine in
stratford new jersey
which used to be part of the university
of medicine and dentistry became part of
rowan
now four years ago is it i think
um my timeline might be a bit off but in
within the last five years right
we've we've we've been given not one but
two different medical schools
and so they're slightly different in
flavor of course an allopathic
versus an osteopathic approach is
something probably we don't really have
time
to get into here and not something to be
honest i'm probably the best person to
answer
so i'll kind of leave that for for
another day
um but both are providing four-year
medical degrees right in in a
pretty traditional way md versus d.o
um
i think the key in this is right
both institutions hold a small number of
seats for
rowan undergraduates coming out of of
the glassboro campus right
they want part of their class to be made
up of rowan university
students right that had a rowan
university undergraduate experience
that is not a large number of seats
right that may be 5
10 seats i forget exactly the numbers in
each case right but that's in an
incoming class of
for cooper now i think the incoming
class is up to 100
all right um so
you should not come to rowan university
and be part of the biology major or any
other major for that matter
with the uh express
belief that that is a guarantee that it
gets you into one of those medical
schools
because it doesn't even if you are
otherwise eligible right
even if you are a very good student with
good grades and you have
extracurriculars to show and great
essays
right they do not want
an incoming class entirely composed
of our own undergraduates and i think if
you think about this carefully it makes
sense right
that right in the same way that in our
university you know
at an undergraduate level wants a
diverse student body
right these medical schools want a
diverse student body
right they they're they want and are
going to be educating students that are
coming from other places in new jersey
that are coming from california or other
places in the us that are coming from
abroad
um and that their express goal is to
train
medical students not just for the state
but for
you know the world as a whole and so
there i think there there can be this
perception that
um because rowan has medical schools
affiliated with it
that an undergrad degree from rowan is a
guaranteed entrance into one of these
medical schools and it's not
um and so i don't want you to come here
thinking that and being disappointed
when that doesn't happen
right it can be a leg up because again
there are a few seats that are reserved
for our undergrads but that's not enough
to account for the whole
class that we're graduating that have
interest in in the medical profession
so it's we're not we're not going to
uh transfer all of you right as rowan
biology majors
graduating your senior year into Rowan
medical students at the two medical
schools it's it's not the way the
programs are set up
so i just i really want to be uh totally
honest with you
that you should not have that
expectation that
just because you're a rowan undergrad
means that you're going to be a Rowan
med student and in fact you may not want
to be right
it's often you know in your best
interest to to go out of state and and
go to another medical school so um
anyways i just i did want to hit on
that uh specific
uh piece of it um and i think dr eaton did
as well so if you read over the q&a
the answers there to those questions he
said i think probably very much the same
thing i did
right so
scrolling through the questions here
sorry to
did you see anything else dr. eaton
that we should hit on
i don't see any new ones um i think we
answered most of them
i don't know i i joined a few minutes
late with some technical issues so i
don't know if you guys
introduced yourselves i know we're at
the ends but if you don't mind i'll
i'll introduce myself to everyone still
here
um i'm dr eaton and
i have a little bit of a different point
of view
in that i was a rowan uh i'm a
rowan alumnus so i was i did my
undergrad at rowan then i went on to
jefferson and got my phd in cell and
developmental biology and now i'm back
teaching cell biology and other classes
at rowan university so if
anyone has any questions about being a
student at rowan feel free to ask them
as well
because i do have i mean it's been a
while
but i have some memories of being a
student at rowan as well
and i i i actually have some memories of
being a freshly minted student at rowan
so i know some of the fears that you may
have
and i remember them a little bit
and actually i think kind of segueing
off of that maybe a bit is
we really want to develop
a relationship with you as a student uh
so that you feel that when you leave
glassboro that you are still part of the
rowan community
right and and a rowan family i mean it
sounds trite sometimes i think when
when organizations talk about developing
a family culture but we are
invested in you well beyond
your four years here um
we want you to succeed and and often
that
success means that there are things that
we can help you with
once you graduate and well beyond
graduation
right there are lots of times where
students will come back
i know to me and i know for other
faculty that will come back
asking for letters of recommendation in
some cases literally 10 years after
they've graduated right or even more
right and i still have often the letter
on file from them and
i and i remember right that one of the
real advantages of having these small
class sizes is
we get to know you and we remember you
right we know who you are
right and that extends beyond so we can
you know write a letter of
recommendation for you
right well past graduation we can have a
conversation with you about
careers and i've done this again right
with students that have
have graduated right that have come back
to me and i've had in class
and they come back and say i'm just not
sure where i'm going on this career path
can we have a conversation about you
know what else is out there
how do i kind of retrain myself uh
am i yeah you know am i making the right
decisions
and i've you know i will spend a lot of
time sometimes
with these students uh more former
students maybe is a better way of saying
it alumni right
and have those conversations well beyond
when they're here
you know during the traditional four
years right
we are we are invested in your success
right
forever right we are we are here for
you on a permanent basis or at least
until we retire um
and you know then you may have to track
us down someplace else in florida or
wherever we retire to but um you know my
intention as long as i am here working
is that i am going to be a resource for
you as a student
and that doesn't mean only when you're
here physically in glassboro
enrolled as an undergraduate it means
you as part of the rowan community
well beyond graduation it's
this is not a
none of this is something that happens
in a finite and
defined time frame right you should not
approach
education in a i am going to go to
college for four years and learn
something and then when i walk out the
door with diploma in hand i am done
learning
all right if you take that approach i
think we have actually failed you
if we have done our job we are going to
hopefully instill in your mindset
you are going to be lifelong learners
that
you're going to continue to learn things
well beyond uh walking out the doors
here at graduation
right and that we have given you the
skills than necessary
to figure out how to learn those things
on your own or to find the resources
that you need to help you
learn those things and
and it's it's not again a question of
relationships
um here either we don't want a
relationship in which at the end of
four years when you graduate we shake
your hand and send you out the door and
say
bye don't ever call us again right it's
exactly the opposite
we really want you to succeed and we're
really going to try and do that
uh help you do that as best as possible
and that that can involve
again conversations and interactions
well beyond
your time here so dr eaton being a
shining example of that
he apparently loved the place so much
that you decided to come back and work
here right
ten years later or so or not quite ten
actually but
close right
i think more than at this point how is
it well you graduate in 2008 right so
you started yeah anyways time doesn't
matter
you get the idea
i was just going to say i actually have
a screaming child in the other room
so i think i will bow out okay
um unless
and as as dr grove said our emails are
easy to find on the website please if
you have additional questions feel free
to email
uh or just want help with something
please
um reach out absolutely
yep thanks dr eaton so i
think we are there are
people kind of slowly kind of making
their way off i think we're we're kind
of
losing a few people in terms of
attendees here as we go so
we might go ahead and wrap this up i
guess i think
every doctor spielman and dr eaton have
been good about answering
all the questions in the q&a box
directly
we've tried to hit on some of the ones i
thought that would be of greater broader
interest to everybody
again but as dr eaton said if you have
questions that you still don't feel
comfortable with
the answers to email
one of us my email
again super easy grove@rowan.edu
send me an email if you want to have a
one-on-one talk i'm happy to do that i
do that all the time with students
it's you know not the same experience
obviously as if we were on campus you
can't come
see me in person but i'm happy to do a
zoom one-on-one with you
if you have something specific that you
really feel like is an in-depth
conversation that you want to have about
careers or um you know
the utility of the program to to where
you feel or want to be
yeah you know taking your your future
self so
i'm happy to talk in a lot more detail
uh later and i'm sure everybody else is
as well
and there there obviously are faculty in
the department that are not here on this
chat this is only the three of us
today but uh we have 12 full-time
faculty by line actually even more than
that
um all of them the other i think there's
19 i counted
well yeah it depends on how you can i
see it right yeah
and even the adjunct faculty are always
happier to talk with students so
um i probably shouldn't give an exact
number there are lots of people in the
department
um who would be happy to talk with you
about uh
various issues either on specific
classes or majors or career paths or any
of that
so please feel free to contact us
even after we sign off so was there
anything you want to say dr spielman
before we kind of
wrap this up or um oh yeah i'll say a
couple a couple things um
so uh the the main thing that's on my
mind these days and probably is on
everybody's mind so we'll just bring it
up one more time is
what's gonna happen next academic year
um the one thing to be
aware of is that whatever happens with
rowan next academic year whether we're
in person in the fall remote and fall
some combination of the two in the fall
um that's not going to be something that
is unique to
rowan that is going to be something that
all of the new jersey schools um
that all the public schools in new
jersey will follow these directives from
the state and you can probably expect
that
most um colleges within the the region
and
delaware new york and pennsylvania and
such
will be doing similar things as well um
so
yes we are we are all waiting to hear
what exactly is going to happen in the
fall
um rest assured we are planning for a
variety of possibilities so that we can
be ready for you guys um
but if right but if we are remote that
does not mean that we are uniquely
remote
everyone's going to be in the same boat
for the foreseeable future um
so there's not going to be a particular
you know hit or something if
you know it's not as though rowan's
going to be remote and everywhere else
in the country is in person we're remote
probably most
most everywhere is remote yeah
um actually somebody just asked me if i
was a professor i just realized
i didn't probably totally introduce
myself
i should have done so i apologize uh
kind of launched into it maybe a little
too quickly so
um somebody asked with her i'm a
professor
so we all are dr eaton uh dr spielman
are faculty in the department right now
my current job is i'm department head
for the department so i'm doing all the
administrative work
for the department but in the fall i'm
going to be back in the classroom i have
not been in the classroom since
fall 2017 unfortunately and i'm
really missing it so come this fall
whether it's in person or remotely i'm
right back there in the classroom with
you so
um yeah and and by training i am a
marine biologist so my research is in
somebody asked about marine biology up
there i said we have marine biology
classes and research but
i was so silly of me to not just say
it's you
know here yeah so
we we offer but i think you know it's
like without looking at the question the
short answer to uh probably a question
like that is
we offer courses in almost every area of
biology right so it's
no matter what your interests are we can
help design a major that kind of fits
your interests and needs
you know it's it's a function of you
know where you want to go and
letting us know that and we can help
with work with you kind of
one-on-one either the professional
advisors or one of the faculty
especially in terms of
which specific classes are going to be
best so yeah
we we can get you where you want to go
in terms of the coursework
anyways i i know this was i think we
were technically scheduled for something
like 45 minutes and yet we've gone an
hour and a half again so
we tend to like to talk um as faculty we
always like to hear ourselves kind of
give great answers to questions
hopefully um
anyways i just wanted to say thank you
all
for attending um hopefully we've
answered your questions but again this
is not the end of the conversation this
is the start of a conversation
um your college career is not the end of
something it's the start of something in
terms of a career and so
this is we can treat this chat as
exactly the same thing
right we're just trying to get the
conversation going and the ball rolling
but
there's lots more conversation to be had
in the future whenever whenever you have
a chance and have questions so
i hope you're all staying safe that your
families are healthy
and everybody is uh doing well
it's it's a strange strange time um
for everybody culturally socially and
especially
educationally so um we're
like as we've said here we're not sure
what's going to happen in the fall yet
but i can promise you no matter what it
is we're going to make the very best of
it that we can
we're we're we are here to help you um
it's a very dedicated department and
university as a whole
i am constantly amazed that at um
the dedication that the faculty and
staff uh and administration at the
university have towards student welfare
we're we're going to help you out
and it may be weird and remote and
not what anybody wants but we're going
to make something useful and valuable
of it for you and and the decision that
you have to come here
we will love to see you either in person
or remotely in the fall
so um in the meantime thanks again for
everybody and
stay safe and healthy okay stay safe bye
