The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/tag/college_of_agriculture_and_life_sciences/)
One of the benefits that is supposed to come from attending an Ivy League university is a vast network of resources. Cornell students are ostensibly privileged with all the guidance and mentorship they can ask for, all at the tip of their fingertips. For the most part, this is true. If we truly need help with a particular problem, we can almost always seek it out. And at the core of this support network is the advising system.
Following the onset of the COVID-19 global pandemic, many on-campus organizations, programs and facilities were forced to close their doors. Cornell’s student-run organic farm, Dilmun Hill, was among these many organizations heavily impacted. Each year, four to five student managers are hired to prepare for the planting season in early spring. They stay through the summer and fall to grow, harvest and distribute food produced on the 12-acre farm plot near the Cornell Orchards on Route 366. Unfortunately this year, because of the sudden undergraduate hiring freeze and other newly-introduced COVID-19 restrictions, Dilmun Hill stayed silent for many of the normally hectic growing months.
Prof. Kathryn Boor ’80, food science, the current dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, will serve as the Graduate School dean and vice provost for graduate education, Provost Michael Kotlikoff announced on Monday afternoon.
Collaboration between the Frank Lab and the Ithaca Children’s Garden creates a do-it-yourself gardening program for local kids in quarantine.
CURB aims to promote undergraduate research on campus, and the fall forum is one platform that allows students to do so. The event was organized by the symposium committee and encourages research from a diverse array of disciplines including biological sciences, engineering and applied science and social sciences.
Although the initiative began with faculty collaboration, professors hope to inspire their students with a similar drive to solve one of the most pressing global problems of the next century.
Conor McCabe ’18, promoted federal funding for agricultural research and land-grant universities in Washington D.C from March 4th to 7th as the first-ever student selected to serve as a delegate for the Association of Public Land Grant Universities’ Council for Agricultural Research, Extension, and Teaching. In an interview with The Sun, McCabe talked about the importance of having a current student’s perspective when making funding decisions relating to education and research. “Many of the individuals who previously served on [CARET] were at the end of their careers, but there had never been a point of view of someone who was currently experiencing the land-grant system as a student,” McCabe said. “I had such a unique story to tell that would show the power of the land-grant university system and how my life has been directly impacted by it.”
The motivation behind McCabe’s involvement in D.C. stemmed not only from his academic background, but also from his personal history. The kinds of agricultural programs for which he advocated in D.C. were similar to those from which he had benefited from in his childhood.
From owls to apples, music to ice cream, the first CALS Day on Friday celebrated the wide span of academic fields pursued by students in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
In the arena of American political discourse, almost every area of life, ranging from religious convictions to familial relations, is subject to attack and satire. This past week, those attacks have hit Cornell particularly hard, as Ann Coulter ’84, right-wing political pundit, mocked the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences on her website.
In a blog post last Wednesday, Coulter, who attended the College of Arts and Sciences, questioned the educational background of Keith Olbermann ’79, one of her left-wing counterparts, who attended the agriculture college.
New York governor David Paterson (D-N.Y.) has imposed a mid-year budget cut that decreased the state funding to Cornell’s four statutory colleges (Human Ecology, Veterinary Medicine, Agriculture and Life Sciences and the Industrial and Labor Relations) from over $159 to $153 million, according to Ron Seeber, vice provost for land grant affairs. This decrease represents a loss of between 6 and 7 percent of their previous state funding for each of the four colleges.
While the $6 million worth of cuts have already been enacted, a further $2.5 million cut is currently being debated for the 09-10 year, and it will not be voted on by the legislature until the budget is approved at the end of March or early April.