Dear Colgate Faculty,
Founders’ Day Convocation is one of the most meaningful gatherings of Colgate’s academic year. A symbolically significant ceremony, convocation marks the start of a new academic year by convening many members of our community to reflect on our origins and imagine our future. I invite you to join your faculty colleagues in receiving the Colgate Class of 2029 on Wednesday evening, August 27.
This year's convocation speaker will be Amy Leventer, professor of earth and environmental geosciences, and the winner of the 2025 Balmuth Award for Teaching. The Balmuth Award was endowed by Mark Siegel ’76, and it is awarded each year to a Colgate faculty member whose teaching is “distinctively successful and transformative, recognizing that such distinction can be achieved through a broad spectrum of methodologies ranging from traditional to innovative.” A micropaleontologist who specializes in paleoclimatic reconstructions of the Antarctic and modern geologic and biologic processes in the southern ocean, Professor Leventer's teaching specialties include oceanography, paleoclimatology, and environmental studies. She is the 2018 recipient of the Goldthwait Polar Medal, awarded by the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center in recognition of her distinguished record of scholarship and service in polar science.
Convocation will be held in the Colgate Memorial Chapel. Faculty members are asked to convene in regalia outside Alumni Hall at 6:45 p.m. At 7:15 p.m., the chapel bells will peal 13 times, marking the beginning of the procession around the quad. Given that the ceremony will take place indoors, where seating is limited, we would like to get a good sense of how many faculty plan to attend. Please complete this RSVP form.
Faculty and staff attending the ceremony are invited to drop by 9 East Kendrick afterward for informal post-ceremony refreshments.
I extend my sincere thanks to all of you who are already engaged with the Class of 2029 — whether as FSEM instructors, commons directors, or in other roles — and look forward to seeing many of you at Founders’ Day Convocation 2025. For those of you who have not yet had the pleasure of interacting with these new students, I hope you will join us in welcoming this class.
With my best wishes for this new academic year,
Lesleigh
Lesleigh Cushing
Provost and Dean of the Faculty
Mark S. Siegel University Professor in Religion and Jewish Studies