In her second address to the General Faculty since taking office last year, President Sian Leah Beilock delivered remarks Thursday afternoon on what she called the “state of the community.”

“Since the day of my appointment I started to hear about the power of the Dartmouth community,” she said. “That word, ‘community’—people kept emphasizing its unique quality at Dartmouth and its importance.” 

And President Beilock said she’s glad to have joined that community. 

“Dartmouth feels like home,” she said. “I hope and intend to be here for a very long time.”

On a crisp fall day, in the Grand Ballroom of the Hanover Inn, Beilock gave her address to nearly 150 members of the faculty, including those watching by livestream. The General Faculty is made up of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the faculties of Geisel School of Medicine, Thayer School of Engineering, and Tuck School of Business. The arts and sciences faculty serves both undergraduates and the Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies. 

“Everything we’ve done this past year has been about tending to that community. It hasn’t always been perfect. We haven’t always gotten it right, but that is always the goal: To make it easier to live here and succeed here,” she said. “Across the areas of focus I laid out at my inauguration, which were built based on input from all of you—mental health, dialogue, sustainability, innovation and impact, lifelong Dartmouth—I see community as a common thread.”

This sense of community, Beilock said, enables Dartmouth to do “what universities are for, which is to have dialogue and debate that will push our thinking forward, our students forward as leaders, and our discoveries forward. That kind of discourse is not always easy, as we saw last academic year.” 

Asserting that “a strong community” is one in which no one feels unwelcome, in which members “embrace productive and civil debates and discussions,” and that “defends free speech and expression,” she continued: “As we’ve had these tough conversations over the past year, I could not be more proud of the work this faculty has done to facilitate meaningful dialogue.”

That work has included launching the Dartmouth Dialogues initiative, which is creating programming to facilitate conversations and skills that bridge personal and political divides. 

In discussing the importance of having difficult conversations on important topics, Beilock noted, “our faculty in every classroom have been doing this for years.”

Updating the faculty on Dartmouth’s progress on mental health and well-being, Beilock described Commitment to Care, the strategic plan for undergraduate mental health launched last year, as “the most comprehensive plan in the nation.” Among other accomplishments, the plan has provided mental health first aid training to 441 members of the faculty and staff and increased staffing at the Counseling Center, where nearly 60% of counselors now identify as Black, Indigenous, or people of color, “allowing us to provide culturally sensitive care to all.”

In addition, Beilock said Dartmouth is taking a holistic approach to mental health that includes “housing, child care, how we pay and support our faculty and staff—recognizing that all of these matter to our well-being.” Examples include a new stipend, introduced last fall, of up to $4,000 a year for child care for benefits-eligible employees and a commitment to work toward increasing the quantity and quality of child care, especially of infant and toddler care, in the Upper Valley.

On housing, Beilock described ongoing efforts to add 1,000 beds to the community over the next decade, including doubling Dartmouth’s commitment to $3 million for the Upper Valley Loan Fund and launching a $500 million undergraduate housing program to build new residence halls near campus—starting with development on West Wheelock Street that has begun this fall—and renew existing residence halls in the next decade. 

Beilock also spoke about the Dartmouth Climate Collaborative, a $500 million, five-year investment in decarbonization on campus that will “turn our campus into a living lab for students to research, innovate, and collaborate.”

She pointed out the research Dartmouth faculty are doing on sustainability, climate, and the changing Arctic, and also noted that scholars across the institution are helping to innovate and have an impact in such fields as artificial intelligence and digital therapeutics for opioid addiction.

Toward “building a Lifelong Dartmouth,” the president described the recent opening of a satellite undergraduate career center in McNutt Hall and efforts to continue to engage alumni throughout their careers. 

“But as we talk about engaging alumni I want to make an important point here, too: As much as we care what alumni think and will continue to listen on critical issues affecting our community, it is the faculty and staff and leadership in this room and on our campus that shape our direction,” she said. “Faculty are working across departments and schools to do amazing things.”

It was the guidance and expertise of Dartmouth faculty, she said, that in the past year led the institution to retain diversity statements that are “crucial to ensuring diversity of thought and experience on our campus.”

“Just a few weeks ago, we welcomed the most socioeconomically diverse class in Dartmouth’s history, the Class of 2028. A class with an all-time high percentage of Pell Grant recipients, with 15% from rural backgrounds, a new emphasis for us, and a class with sustained racial and ethnic diversity, at a moment our peers struggle to do so,” she said. “What we’re doing is working in so many ways.”

After Beilock’s remarks, the faculty heard an update on the Arts and Sciences Future project from the co-chairs, Provost David Kotz ’86 and Niehaus Family Professor in International Studies Nina Pavcnik. The project, launched in 2022, is proposing a new organizational and budgetary model to support the teaching, scholarship, and student experience in the arts and sciences. The Faculty of Arts and Sciences is scheduled to hold an advisory vote on the proposal on Oct. 30 before it is taken up by the president and, next month, the Board of Trustees.

The faculty also heard from Samuel Levey, professor of philosophy and associate dean of the faculty for the arts and humanities, and John Carey, the John Wentworth Professor in the Social Sciences, about work being done by ad hoc faculty committees on Freedom of Expression and Dissent and Institutional Statements.

Senior Vice President for Community and Campus Life Jennifer Rosales invited faculty to become involved in an expanded  Open Expression Facilitators Program to serve as a resource at campus events, ensure open channels of communication and opportunities for dialogue, and make sure that participants have access to institutional resources and policies.

And Senior Vice President of Capital Planning and Campus Operations Josh Keniston gave an update on the housing program and talked about new construction on West Wheelock Street, renewing existing undergraduate residence halls, opening up more space for graduate student housing, and expecting to have news in the future on developing new faculty and staff housing. He also provided an overview of progress on Dartmouth’s transition to renewable energy toward the goal of a 60% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and net zero carbon emissions by 2050.