Provost and Dean of the Faculty Lesleigh Cushing sent an email to the Colgate University community announcing the continuous tenure and promotion of select faculty members on Monday, Feb. 6.

“Our newly-tenured colleagues are all very accomplished professionally and together have made significant contributions to our academic curriculum and intellectual community, as well as to their respective scholarly communities,” Cushing wrote.

The continuous tenure and promotion to Associate Professor was granted to Sally Bonet, Department of Educational Studies; Seth Coluzzi, Department of Music; Aaron Gember-Jacobson, Department of Computer Science; Margaretha Haughwout, Department of Art and Art History; Santiago Juarez, Department of Sociology and Anthropology; Jennifer LeMesurier, Department of Writing and Rhetoric; Benjamin Lennertz, Department of Philosophy; Joseph Levy, Department of Earth and Environmental Geoscience; Matthew D. Luttig, Department of Political Science; and Andrew Pattison, Department of Environmental Studies.

In regard to this milestone achievement, LeMesurier highlighted her emotional connection to the university.

“I feel like I have more school spirit for Colgate than for my own alma mater,” LeMesurier said. “This really is a special place. I am honestly so thankful for all the resources Colgate has given me to finish my book and do other research, and I am so excited that I get to stay here and keep teaching my amazing students.”

While the tenure of faculty is a motivating practice, not all schools are able to provide opportunities such as this, Haughwout noted.

“In the past few decades there has been a devastating decrease in tenure-track positions in the US,” Haughwout said. “So many amazing scholars are severely economically compromised in order to pursue their love of teaching. I am honored to work at a university committed to tenuring their faculty.”

One of Haughwout’s students, sophomore Anabel Viera, was excited to hear of her tenure announcement.

“Not only is she an incredibly creative and talented person, but you can tell from the moment you begin working with her that she truly wants to see her students succeed and will do whatever she can to help them do so,” Viera said. “She really cares about learning as a process, and works to make her classroom a space where it is okay to be wrong or confused and ask questions freely. She is an amazing professor and anyone would be lucky to take a class with her!”

With the security of many future years at Colgate, some professors reflected upon what they hope to accomplish going forward, including Jacobson.

“[Tenure] will allow me to dedicate time to endeavors I’ve wanted to pursue, including developing and teaching a new introductory computer science course and an elective on software testing and verification, pursuing new research directions in socially-responsible computer networks, and leading efforts to improve diversity, equity, and inclusion in STEM at Colgate,” Jacobson said.

Bonet noted a similar enthusiasm for future research.

 “As I look to the future, I want to continue to teach and learn about global complexity, diversity, and change, while also making connections to the ways that all of these tensions affect all of us here in Central New York,” Bonet said.

While Lennertz does not think tenure will alter his day-to-day at large, he agrees that it makes the often uncertain future of teaching much clearer going forward.

“With the hurdle behind me, I hope to be more creative and take more risks in my teaching and my research,” Lennertz said.

“Professor Lennertz inspires his students to not just learn, but engage with material–and will always take the time to work through any questions or theories (even the most outlandish ones) you throw his way,” senior Jared Dienst, one of Lennertz’s students, said. “He also has a great sense of humor. In sum, Professor Lennertz is a fantastic long-term addition to an already remarkable philosophy department here at Colgate.”

Cushing concluded her announcement by congratulating the newly tenured faculty members, and urging community members to “join me in congratulating them on their well-deserved promotions.”