Colleagues,

I write to thank many you for agreeing to serve as a Graduate Program Director, Grad
Council member or an alternate, in Grad Student leadership role and/or in other
support/administrative roles. I look forward to working with all of you to have a stronger
voice and greater presence of the Graduate Studies at UW-L. With your strong support, we
have made progress in bringing due recognition to the Graduate Studies and I continue to be
optimistic about a better future of Graduate Studies at this fine institution.

1. Grad Council meetings: Please mark your calendar for the meeting dates of The
Grad Council (starting at 10 am in 325 GMH unless otherwise announced) given
below. Please note that all meetings are open except when the Council needs to go in
a closed session, typically, when academic dismissal or other appeals are heard. We
plan to hold a joint meeting of the Graduate Program Directors, Graduate Council
and Graduate Student Organization (GSO) leadership on October 2. Everyone is
welcome to the joint meeting. All other important dates for the fall semester are
available at http://www.uwlax.edu/Graduate/

FALL MEETING DATES: September 11, September 25; October 2 (JOINT MEETING);
October 23; November 20; December 4; and December 18 (if needed).
The enclosed document provides tentative agenda items for the Grad Council meetings.
However, please be advised that the agenda may change at the discretion of the Graduate
Council.

2. Your Ideas: Please share with me If you have any specific issues/concerns/new
initiatives that Graduate Studies should pay a particular attention to. I have a
Graduate Assistant (Michelle Stertz) in my office who will be working on special
projects and if you have one in mind, I am happy to talk with you.
3. GRC 799 and GRADUATE FACULTY: Please remember to send names of
students to Nancy Jones with a copy to me who need to be registered for GRC 799 for
the fall 2009, if you have not done so already. I realize that Department Chairs assign
instructional load for faculty but if you know a colleagues who might be engaged in
graduate instruction and is not a Grad Faculty, please assist them to apply for the
Provisional status right away followed by the regular appointment.
4. Future Recruitment: Graduate Studies is very interested in recruiting high achieving
graduate students in general and students of color in particular. If you have any ideas
on recruiting graduate students, please feel free to talk with me.
5. Graduate Assistantships and Non-resident Tuition Remissions: I am happy to note
that all GA allocations and non-resident tuition remissions for 2009-10 are complete.
To the best of my knowledge, every eligible non-resident graduate student is
receiving at least partial tuition remission. If you know of any non-resident student
without tuition remission support, please contact me. Allocations for assistantships
and non-resident tuition waivers for 2010-11 will be made to the respective colleges
within the next month or so.
6. UW System Graduate Administrators Meeting: UW-L will be the host of this
meeting on October 14, 2009. This is the third time we will meet to network with
colleagues, exchange ideas, and discuss best practices. One of the topics in October

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 meeting will be a presentation by Jay Lokken about Internationalization at UW-L
with a focus on Graduate Students. You are welcome to attend.
7. Graduate Student Organization: GSO has Teri Passow and Tera Lazarre (from
SAA program) as co-chairs. They organized the Graduate Student Orientation on
September 2, 2009 which was very well attended (about 70 students). The students
were greeted by Chancellor Gow, Provost Enz Finken and many of you. We still miss
out on several graduate programs and the goal is to have a broader representation of
graduate programs. If you have any suggestions, please feel free to share with me.
In addition, we are always seeking student leaders from various graduate program
who would be willing to take leadership role on different committees. Please send
their names to me and I will work with GSO leadership to further identify their
interest. I plan to write to all graduate students but I will make extra effort to get in
touch with those you recommend. We need graduate student leaders who can speak
with stronger voice in the Student Senate and various other committees.
8. Graduate Student Grants: As you know we have two grant programs (Research,
Service and Educational Leadership grants and Professional Travel grants) for
graduate students. The Fall RSEL grants are due October 16 and the Professional
travel grant submission deadline in the fall are September 11 and December 11.
Please encourage your students to apply for these grants. The Graduate Student
Organization is also sponsoring a Grant Writing Workshop on Monday, September 28
at 6:30 pm in Cartwright 339. Please attend if you can and encourage your students to
attend. Refreshments will be served at 6:00 pm. I am also pleased to include the
snapshot of Graduate Student Research activity in 2008-09. Please note the growth
which I hope, with your support and encouragement, will become the future trend.
9. UW-L Foundation: At our request, we have been asked by the Foundation Board to
make a brief presentation about Graduate Studies on September 25, 2009. I am
pleased to note that Rob Dixon, John Porcari and Mark Sandheinrich have agreed to
join me for the 15-20 minutes presentation. This will be our very first presentation
and I hope it is not the last as we seek Foundation support for the Graduate Studies.

Once again thank you for being part of the Grad Studies team in 2009-10.

VJ

Vijendra Agarwal
Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs
Offices of Graduate Studies, Research and Sponsored Programs
University of Wisconsin-La Crosse
La Crosse, WI 54601
Phone: 608-785-8007
Fax: 608-785-8743