Dear LMU Community:
I am pleased to reappoint Tina Choe as dean of the LMU Frank R. Seaver College of Science and Engineering. This year marks her 25th anniversary at LMU as professor of chemistry, serving the past six as dean. Her thoughtful leadership has greatly benefited the college and the university, and I look forward to our continued work together. Below I highlight a few of her notable accomplishments.
Dean Choe’s bold vision and leadership contributed to successful fundraising for Seaver College during her years as dean. In partnership with University Advancement, Seaver raised over $47.5 million which has provided new scholarships, supported student success initiatives, improved facilities, and contributed to securing Seaver’s future through endowments.
A true champion for student achievement, Dean Choe launched the “90 percent plus” initiative five years ago that focuses on excellence in student success. Along with building a strong professional team to support students in Seaver’s Center for Student Success, she helped launch programs that render high-impact experiential learning opportunities for students. Dean Choe secured a $1.5 million endowment to establish the Seaver Summer Opportunity for Advanced Research (SOAR) program which funds faculty-mentored research opportunities for undergraduate students. Seaver also launched Google CSSI (Computer Science Summer Institute), a partnership with Google, that supports and empowers incoming first-year female and underrepresented students in the field of computing. Seaver’s steadfast commitment to students resulted in continued excellent first-year student retention and other outcomes. Lastly, in addition to ACCESS, PEEC, and LEAP — which are Seaver’s successful first-year learning communities — Seaver will launch a new learning community called iSTEM to support all incoming first-year students in fall 2020.
Dean Choe is committed to recruiting a diverse group of stellar teacher-scholars who are deeply aligned with our mission. During her term, 26 tenure-line faculty, six instructors, and four clinical professors were recruited, which is roughly 37 percent of all full-time faculty in Seaver. In particular, Seaver increased the number of women faculty, most notably in several departments where there has been a low percentage of women or no women faculty.
Her savvy leadership enhanced Seaver’s graduate programs. With Dean Choe’s support, the college’s faculty developed and launched several new graduate and certificate programs. With updated curricula, increased efforts in recruitment, outreach, and marketing, Seaver graduate enrollment increased by 29 percent over the past two years. After another successful recruitment cycle, Seaver expects their largest graduate enrollments in fall 2020.
During her term, Dean Choe successfully led all three undergraduate engineering programs (electrical, civil, and mechanical) through the rigorous ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology) reaccreditation process. ABET issued a rare commendation, citing the impressive level of college support for engineering students to participate in a variety of professional activities to help students enhance their career opportunities.
Given the importance of facilities and instrumentation to the success of science and engineering programs, Dean Choe, through fundraising and partnership with Facilities Management and the university, has achieved transformative outcomes. Most notable is her dedicated and impactful leadership, from concept to completion, of the construction of the nationally recognized Bruce Featherston Life Sciences Building. Dean Choe also secured donor support to build the Cheryl and Robert Gross Engineering Design Center dedicated to engineering design projects. Recently, Seaver completed a major renovation of East Hall to provide much needed space for student projects and offices. Dean Choe is an enthusiastic advocate for a new engineering innovation complex. She continues to provide excellent leadership to secure funding and to move this essential project forward. Lastly, the college invested more than $5 million for research and teaching-related instrumentation during the past several years, greatly enhancing Seaver’s laboratory curricula and research programs.
Building a stronger Seaver community has been one of Dean Choe’s top priorities. As well as initiatives that bring together the internal community, Dean Choe established various programs and events to connect with alumni, industry partners, and external constituents: Seaver Spotlight, a program that features distinguished alumni and professional leaders; Seaver Connect, a networking event; and the Engineering Design Showcase, a program that features innovative engineering capstone projects, have brought together hundreds of participants annually to build a more vibrant Seaver community. By strategically enhancing outreach efforts and increasing visibility of college successes through social media and other communication strategies, the college has reaped many benefits.
Partnering with The Bay Foundation, Seaver successfully launched the Coastal Research Institute. This collaboration has increased research opportunities for faculty and students across departments and colleges that contribute to the restoration and enhancement of Santa Monica Bay.
Dean Choe’s leadership at the university level, through her participation on various committees and task forces, including the Deans’ Council, University Budget Planning Committee, Strategic Planning Committee, and serving as co-chair for the Provost Search Committee, has invigorated our LMU community.
Please join me in congratulating Dean Choe on her many successes and in thanking her for the leadership she has already provided. I am grateful she will continue serving in this essential role at Loyola Marymount University during this critical time.
Sincerely,
Thomas Poon, Ph.D.
Executive Vice President and Provost
