ADS Department Head Letter

Dear Animal and Dairy Science friends,

This issue of our ADS newsletter focuses on the things we are doing in the Rhodes Center to enrich the experiences of our students and give them a greater sense of belonging to an Animal and Dairy Science family, as well as a department.

We are also going to focus on things that we’re doing to honor the traditions and heritage of the Department of Animal and Dairy Science, as we want our alumni to have a lifelong connection and sense of belonging. Finally, we want to pay homage to a great leader, Dr. Louis Boyd, whose legacy of excellence and caring greatly contributed to agricultural research, teaching, and Extension at the University of Georgia.

On December 7th, we had our first Open House for the Regenerative Bioscience Undergraduate Major, and it was a huge success! Our Regenerative Bioscience faculty welcomed high school students, their families, and high school teachers to the UGA Animal and Dairy Science Department. This was a great event and allowed potential students to explore opportunities and engage in hands-on learning experiences across all of our RBIO labs. This is a rapidly increasing major, with 52 undergraduates in the Fall Semester of 2023, and 84 undergraduates in the Fall Semester of 2024.

On December 4th, our Animal and Dairy Science Department hosted a free lunch for our students and staff. Last spring semester, I started to do an exit interview with all the students taking the Senior Seminar, thanks to Dr. Robert Dove making it an assignment. Through these interviews, I learned that 30% to 40% of our students are food insecure. So, since the 4th was reading day before final exams started, we had a grab-and-go lunch buffet. It was paid for largely through donations. As we have students from many countries, religions, and eating preferences, we served all-beef hamburgers and hot dogs, as well as brats and smoked sausage, vegetarian burgers, roasted vegetables, baked beans with or without bacon, coleslaw, and desserts. In addition, we recently started having free coffee in our newly renovated student study lounge. Others, and I, have directed our UGA monthly donations to go to the Animal and Dairy Science Discretionary Fund (81192000) as a way to have funds to support our student efforts. Finally, a group of our students, staff, and faculty are working with various offices at UGA, and the community, to have a food pantry for students and staff who need assistance. I am thankful to be in a department with caring people, in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences with a focus on improving the lives of people in Georgia, and across the globe. Thus, helping those closest to us just feels right. I really want this to become a tradition in ADS.

I hope that you enjoy our newsletter. And, as always, if you have comments or concerns, you can reach me at ffluharty@uga.edu.

Sincerely,

Francis Fluharty
Animal and Dairy Science Department Head