Dear GW Business Community,
This is a special week in the life of our George Washington University community as we celebrate the inauguration of Ellen M. Granberg as our 19th president. This multi-day series of events will culminate with a formal investiture ceremony on Friday, November 3. I am looking forward to our long-awaited George Talks Business session with President Granberg later today.
President Granberg joined us on October 27 as we celebrated our newly-modernized and upgraded lobby, lounge spaces, instructional innovation studio, and classrooms with Henry “Ric” Duquès (B.B.A. ’65, M.B.A. ’69) and Dr. Dawn Brill Duquès (B.A. ‘69) and their family. Having the celebration in Duquès Hall, where we could see Ric and Dawn’s vision coming to fruition was a wonderful way to honor them and the infrastructure they have enabled for our School. Through their generosity, the Duquès family has opened up new possibilities for how our students can learn and connect, and provided us with new ways to spotlight the events and gatherings that keep our hallways bustling with excitement each semester.
I recently had the opportunity to travel to the Bay Area for a gathering of alumni, friends, parents and other supporters of GW Business, hosted by Susie Selby (M.B.A. ’85). Ms. Selby is the owner and winemaker of Selby Winery, where the event was held. This marked the 11th annual gathering she has hosted for us at the winery. I thank Ms. Selby for providing these many years of memories, and for her dedication to the GW School of Business, including serving as a member of our School’s Board of Advisors.
It is hard to believe that we are already nearing the final month of the year. This has been a productive semester. I enjoyed talking to the speakers for our most recent session of George Talks Business, William Chappell, vice president and chief technology officer of the Strategic Missions and Technologies Division at Microsoft, and Nitin Natarajan, deputy director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). Cybersecurity and artificial intelligence are areas where we continue to be diligent, in not only staying apprised of how it is affecting the workforce and overall market, but also in determining how we can be responsive through our capabilities as a research and academic institution, and a disseminator of ideas and thought leadership.
I look forward to our visit from the AACSB accreditation peer review team from November 12-14. I would like to thank everyone for their willingness to host the team as we move forward in this process. We will both share our successes and also ask for feedback, which will help the GW School of Business achieve more in the future. In closing, I would like to congratulate Kyle Welch who has earned tenure and promotion to associate professor in the Department of Accountancy. We are proud to recognize Professor Welch and other faculty who exemplify research and teaching excellence and our highest standards for tenure and promotion at GW.
Stay safe and stay well,
Anuj Mehrotra, Ph.D.
Dean