The below message was sent to faculty on May 27, 2026.
Dear Faculty Colleagues,
Below please find my response to the 2026 Report from CAP. I'm grateful for the work of the committee and our collaborations this year.
Have a good summer.
With thanks,
Wendy
Dear Colleagues,
I write in response to CAP's Annual Report to the Faculty dated April 14, 2026. I am grateful to the faculty on the committee who worked tirelessly with senior administrators and staff throughout the year on a range of issues core to the academic priorities of the College. I am excited about the Interdisciplinary Innovation Grants awarded by CAP this year and encouraged by growing institutional clarity in our Bi- and Tri-Co relationships as well as by the grants awarded to further academic collaboration in the Bi-Co.
Meaningful connections between faculty and students are at the heart of the College's mission and, with the launch of The Next Chapter, we commit to even further strengthening these academic relationships. The transition to a 2-2 teaching load and our collective thinking about the liberal arts of the future will remain core as we prepare undergraduates to engage deeply with the life of the mind and prepare for their professional and personal lives after graduation. I look forward to continued collaboration among CAP, the Curriculum Committee, and the senior administration (who are responsible for the financial resources), as CAP continues to make recommendations to support, in its words, a "flexible forward-looking curriculum that will serve our students now and in the future" (p. 2).
In collaboration with the Provost's Office, I encourage CAP to continue to think– as it did this year - about how we build our faculty in fields core to the liberal arts and aligned with growing student interests in interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary fields. Conversations about the balance among tenure-line, contract, and visiting positions will be key in the coming years as we work to raise the endowed funds required for more tenure-line faculty hiring. The institutional research offices at Bryn Mawr and Haverford made important progress this year in sharing enrollment data, which is helping to clarify our existing academic agreements and the potential for further academic resource sharing.
I support the recommendations CAP makes in this report for faculty positions, with two additional thoughts.
First, there is sustained faculty and student interest in African-American / Black Studies at the College and eagerness to continue the curricular planning set in process this academic year. I understand that CAP is not yet ready to approve a tenure-line hire at the rank of Associate or Full Professor in Africana Studies. Provost Matthews and I fully support the momentum in Black Studies and, in lieu of a tenure-line hire, will support a one-year visiting faculty member in 2026-27 who is tenured in this interdisciplinary field. This colleague will partner with our current faculty to complete the curricular work and planning and resubmit the proposal to hire a tenured faculty member to CAP next year.
Second, I am aware that many of our science departments are stretched because they teach undergraduates and postbacs, and – in some cases – graduate students. I have asked Provost Matthews to convene a committee of those teaching in the Postbac Program to assess the teaching needs and resources for these students. These conversations will position the College to more fully support the range of teaching needs in the sciences and make more faculty-informed decisions going forward.
The background materials CAP gathered and reviewed this year, as well as its conversations with a range of other faculty committees, administrators, and colleagues at Haverford were exemplary. I am grateful for each member of the committee, their careful discernment, their dedicated service, and their care for the College's academic mission.
Have a good summer,
Wendy
Wendy Cadge
President and Professor of Sociology
Bryn Mawr College
101 N. Merion Ave., Bryn Mawr, PA 19010
Pronouns: she/her
brynmawr.edu
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