Competing for and winning top awards drives us forward and creates a positive climate for interdisciplinary collaboration, inquiry, discovery and innovation.

Three new recipients of NSF CAREER Awards, the National Science Foundation’s top award supporting our country’s most promising junior researchers, is not only a great boost to our national research profile, but to the power of research across disciplines: Adriana Dawes, assistant professor, mathematics and molecular genetics; and Chuan Xue, assistant professor, mathematics, work at the intersection of mathematics and biology. Ian Krajbich, assistant professor, economics, is a neuroeconomist, who combines tools from psychology, neuroscience and economics to investigate mechanisms behind decision-making.

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When the College of Arts and Sciences came together five years ago, one of its founding premises was that having a unified college would enhance our collective ability to articulate and advocate for the continuing importance of a liberal arts education both at Ohio State and in public research institutions more generally. My commitment to that premise is one of the things that excited me about coming to Ohio State, and it continues to guide my priorities both as a leader and for the college.

In the spirit of this ongoing commitment, I submitted a letter to the editor to The Columbus Dispatch, which was printed last Sunday. The immediate context for my letter was the article, Arts and sciences faculty want Ohio State to admit more humanities majors (2/15/16). My broader purpose for writing the letter was to address the ongoing public perception — reflected even in some of the comments on the article — that “You can’t get a job with a degree in … [name of any humanities major].”

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