Please join us for the 2024 Cal Poly Veritas Forum:
“Can I be Spiritual but not Religious?” Wednesday evening May 1st Chumash Auditorium 7:30pm-9:00pm
Tim Muehlhoff (Communications, Biola University) Elizabeth Barrett (Psychology, Cal Poly) moderated by Steven Lloyd-Moffett (Religious Studies, Cal Poly)
Founded at Harvard University in 1992, the Veritas Forum seeks to “engage students and faculty in discussions about life’s hardest questions and the relevance of Jesus Christ to all of life.”
Please join us for a special lunch discussion on February 15 at 11am-12pm in 10-206 centering around how faith speaks to setting priorities and achieving balance as academics. Our panel will feature:
Donna Templeston, Graphic Communication
Paul Marchbanks, English
There will be time for discussion and a complimentary lunch will be provided. This 2020 article in Nature Briefing considers this very topic from a work-life balance, mental health perspective.
Please respond to the calendar invite or email Chip Appel cappel@calpoly.edu by February 12th if you’re planing on joining us.
Please join us Friday night February 23rd 7:30pm as students and faculty from Cal Poly, plus Cuesta and Hancock, gather together for a time of worship, prayer, and reflection. Renovate Church 2075 Johnson Avenue, San Luis Obispo.
“Winds of Change” Conference Saturday, March 2, 2024 8:30 am-3:30 pm Seal Beach, CA
Artificial Intelligence and the Christian Professor. Two Christian computer science professors will inform us of the origins, limits, ethics and other facets of AI. Several professors from other disciplines will explain how they are using AI, and what they have learned.
Registration and more information for in person conference participation here.
If you are unable to attend in person, a free webinar option is available (9am-2pm PST). While online small group breakout sessions will not be offered, you’re welcome to watch and discuss with colleges . Please register by Feb. 29th here.
George Varghese (https://samueli.ucla.edu/people/george-varghese/) is the Jonathan B. Postel Professor of Networking in the Computer Science department at UCLA. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2017, to the National Academy of Inventors in 2020, to the Internet Hall of Fame in 2021, and to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2022. He has worked on algorithmic techniques for speeding up routers, on new formal methods to proactively prevent Internet errors, and most recently on using Large Language Models (that underlie ChatGPT for example) in networking. https://www.internethalloffame.org/2023/05/11/george-varghese-speeding-up-the-internet-finding-confluence/
After earning his PhD in machine learning from Carnegie Mellon University, George Montañez became a data scientist with Microsoft (AI+R), and is currently an assistant professor of Computer Science at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, CA. He holds an M.S. in computer science from Baylor University and a B.S. in computer science from the University of California Riverside. A former NSF Graduate Research Fellow and Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellow, he served as an intern at Microsoft Research and Yahoo! Labs during graduate school. His research lies at the intersection of machine learning, algorithmic search, and information theory. His work has garnered five conference awards, including Best Paper at CIKM 2014 and ICAART 2020. He is passionate about mentoring and teaching, and has worked with roughly 90 undergraduate student researchers, being awarded a Diversity Mentoring Award by the Claremont Colleges Consortium and the Iris and Howard Critchell Assistant Professorship from 2019-2022 in recognition of his mentoring efforts inside and outside the classroom. https://www.hmc.edu/about/news/experts/george-montanez/https://www.linkedin.com/in/georgemontanez/
Please consider joining us as students, faculty, and campus ministry staff meet every Monday morning this quarter to pray for the campus, the larger community, and revival in our own own lives. Students, especially, are excited about the opportunity to pray alongside faculty and we hope you’ll consider this opportunity.
Another Conference? Ethan Kung, Mechanical Engineering
Academic conferences. Man… I hate those things.
I’ve been told that conferences are places for networking to advance my career. I never could bring myself to network with this intent – it felt disingenuous and exhausting. Time after time, I felt that I failed with every attempt.
However, an academic conference I attended this summer was the best conference experience I have ever had.
I was fed up with my previous experiences and decided this time I would have two goals and nothing else: 1) serve in whatever way beneficial for everyone and 2) have fun.
Someone posted a thread on the conference app asking if anyone wanted to play volleyball at the hotel sand court. Nobody responded. I thought, “Volleyball could be fun,” and the lack of response may be that nobody wanted to be the first to respond to a “non-professional” activity.
Keeping in line with my two goals, I responded. Immediately others started responding. I went ahead and picked a time and scheduled a ”meetup,” which ended up having over 30 RSVPs and was requested the next day again.
After seeing how successful that turned out, I got bolder. An idea came to me about setting up a Christian gathering. I know that it is easy to compartmentalize parts of life that are “God-related” versus “Not God-related.” I thought a Christian gathering at the conference could be valuable in helping to break this compartmentalization.
Not knowing if anyone would respond, I simply picked a time and location and posted a meetup on the conference app. It felt slightly nerve-wracking because I was afraid of being the guy who tries to start a Christian gathering at a professional conference that everyone ignores.
To my relief and slight surprise, 13 people RSVP’d. The gathering was very encouraging. It was special to connect with brothers and sisters in a world where God is rarely discussed. Everyone was highly appreciative of the gathering and requested that we repeat it every year in the future.
God used the visibility of my participation as a faculty member in these things to draw students to me who were seeking mentoring.
Two Christian students approached me and wanted to schedule a time to talk. One of the students met me through the volleyball, and the other saw that I organized the Christian gathering. I was able to meet with each of them during the conference to offer encouragement and share my experiences of my attempts to balance my Christian walk in the academic environment.
I did not do any intentional networking at this conference — some people sought me and talked to me. I had a meaningful experience and lots of fun.
Was my investment in this conference beneficial for my career? I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter.
While I’ve enjoyed some academic success before, this conference was a vivid reminder that if I were to pick between experiencing a successful life versus a meaningful one, I’d pick the latter any day of the week.
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Dr. Ethan Kung (Mechanical Engineering, Clemson University) recently shared the above article as a Faculty Commons “Missional Moment.” Several of our G3 small groups meeting this week took time to discuss this article. The G3 groups will be re-starting again next quarter, if you’d like to be in one, please let us know.
As part of a national network of Christian faculty, Faculty Commons is designed to help encourage and support faculty around the country. If you’d like to receive the Missional Moment – a short, weekly email published every Tuesday – you can sign up to do so here.
Many thanks to everyone who was to join us for our quarterly lunch gathering. Chris Dicus share about his personal and professional journey, and where he could see hand of God along the way: both in some encouraging, as well as some very challenging and difficult, experiences. There was also a chance for some small group interaction.
The lunch event continues to be a place where faculty – from whatever background – and connect and share about their own faith journeys. We love this comment from a faculty member joining us for the first time: “I wanted to thank you both for today’s event through Faculty Commons. It was really interesting, and it did resonate with me a lot. It is the first event that I attended a Faculty Commons gathering and the first time I had the opportunity to pray at Cal Poly during my almost 6 years here, let alone along with colleagues. To me, that was priceless, and constituted a refreshing and hopeful moment … Thank you for including me, and please let me know of any future event. All the best”
Please consider joining for lunch next quarter, tentatively scheduled for Thursday of 7th week (Thursday February 22nd 11:10am-12pm), location tba.
Faculty Commons is hosting a special lunch event and you are invited!
When: Thursday, Nov 9th from 11:10 – 12:00 pm
Where: Bldg 10, Room 241
What: Pizza lunch, round-table discussion, and a speaker
Topic: What is success?
Success is the accomplishment of a goal or purpose. So, what are our goals? And how should our Christain faith impact those goals and how we achieve them? In a job governed by merit, how can we be salt and light to the campus community?
Come hear the thoughts from a fellow Christian professor and discuss your ideas too.
Please RSVP on the calendar invite so we can plan accordingly for the pizza. But still come even if you forget to RSVP.
Please join us Friday night November 3rd 7:30pm a students and faculty from Cal Poly, plus Cuesta and Hancock, gather together for a time of worship, prayer, and reflection. Renovate Church 2075 Johnson Avenue, San Luis Obispo.
Professor Paul Marchbanks (English) will be screening John Michael McDonagh’s Calvary (2014) at the SLO Public Library Friday September 29th at 6 pm, in the Community Room (down the outdoor stairs, to the right—before you reach the main entrance.) This is an outstanding, powerful film.
This event – of course – is open to the larger San Luis Obispo community. We hope you’ll consider joining us. There will be a brief 5 minute introduction before the film, and discussion for 20 minutes or so after the 95-minute film.
Faculty Commons SLO 