Cornell Family Fellows Spring Weekend

We were thrilled to welcome our Family Fellows back to campus on March 3-5, 2023 for an exciting weekend filled with opportunities to connect with faculty and Cornell leadership.

Please check back for the latest information about next year’s Spring Weekend, March 8-10, 2024.

Friday, March 3, 2023

  • 3:00 - 4:00 p.m. Career Services and Your Student: Supporting career development through their first-year, to graduation and beyond!

    Location: Amphitheater, Statler Hotel
    Discussion with Erica Kryst, Executive Director, Cornell Career Services

     

    Cornell Career Services provides the career resources and support students need to achieve their career goals while at Cornell. Learn about new innovations in career resources that put industry and career readiness knowledge at students’ fingertips from the new Executive Director of Cornell Career Services, Erica Kryst. Dr. Kryst will also share tips on how parents can get involved with and support their own students’ career development.

  • 5:30 - 7:00 p.m. Family Fellows Weekend Welcome Reception with Cornell Academic Leadership

    Location: Duffield Hall Atrium
    Reception for parents, students, and honored guests
    with remarks by Provost Michael Kotlikoff

     

    Enjoy an evening of mixing and mingling with other Cornell families, university leaders, faculty, and staff over drinks and light refreshments. You’ll hear from Cornell Provost Michael Kotlikoff and be treated to Cornell student entertainment. Your students and honored guests are welcome to join in this fun and lively gathering.

  • Dinner on your own

    Enjoy the evening with your student!

Saturday, March 4, 2023

  • 8:00 - 9:15 a.m. Continental Breakfast

    Location: Park Atrium, Robert A. and Jan M. Beck Center, Statler Hall

     

    Enjoy a hearty continental breakfast with other Cornell Family Fellows to start your day of learning and engagement.

  • 9:15 - 10:15 a.m. Dean Talk with Suzanne B. Shu: Applying Behavioral Economics to Retirement Income Decision Making

    Location: Room 196, Beck Center, Statler Hall

     

    Suzanne B. Shu is Dean of Faculty and Research for the Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business and John S. Dyson Professor in Marketing in the Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management. In this session, Dean Shu will share how principles of behavioral economics can be applied to retirement income decision making, including those related to self-control and consumption timing, negative behaviors (procrastination) and positive behaviors (saving). Her work on financial decisions has focused specifically on decumultation during retirement (annuities, Social Security claiming) as well as on perceived fairness for financial products.

  • 10:30 - 11:30 a.m. Dean Talk with Lynden Archer: Regulating interphases in batteries: low-cost storage of energy

    Location: Room 196, Beck Center, Statler Hall

     

    Lynden Archer is the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering and the James A. Friend Family Distinguished professor of Engineering. He will discuss progress towards the electrify-everything strategy for lowering humanity’s carbon footprint. His research addresses technical barriers and molecular design principles that will underpin the next decade of progress towards low-cost, high-performance storage options for integrating renewable energy in the electric power grid.

  • 11:45 a.m. - 1:15 p.m. Family Fellows Keynote Lunch: Community-Engaged Learning across Cornell

    Location: Statler Ballroom, Statler Hotel
    Panel discussion moderated by Vice President Ryan Lombardi, Student and Campus Life,
    featuring academic and student leadership

     

    A hallmark of the transformative Cornell experience is community-engaged learning, where students go beyond the classroom to see firsthand how theory and practice connect in the real world. Central to the university’s land grant mission, these experiential learning opportunities give students the opportunity to collaborate with communities—in Ithaca and around the globe—to design, implement and evaluate real solutions to real problems. Join Vice-President of Student & Campus Life, Ryan Lombardi, for a moderated panel discussion about the multiple pathways for undergraduates to take advantage of community-engaged learning and research at Cornell.

     

    Panelists:
    Basil Safi, Executive Director, David M. Einhorn Center for Community Engagement
    Rachel Dunifon, The Rebecca Q. and James C. Morgan Dean, College of Human Ecology
    Yasmin Ballew ’23 ILR, (President of APO, former Engaged Ambassador, Black Ivy Pre-law Society, Cornell Tradition fellow)
    Karen Yearwood, Operations Effectiveness Manager, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County

  • 1:30 - 2:30 p.m. Dean Talk with Benjamin Z. Houlton: Mission to Earth

    Location: Room 196, Beck Center, Statler Hall

     

    Our world – the Blue Planet – is undergoing radical change through the advancement of human societies and economic growth. How will we manage the life support systems that are essential to our own long-term survival and a thriving nature? My work focused on climate solutions, and the urgent need to bend the carbon curve, providing a set of options for merging people and planet as a symbiotic unit through which our children and our children’s children can experience the only home we have. A major opportunity lies in the power of agriculture as a solution to the climate challenge, one that feeds 10 billion people by 2050 and which protects our climate from extreme changes. Carbon can be a trillion-dollar commodity that incentivizes sustainability, launches new careers and supports a safe and equitable future. This is a mission to planet Earth which requires “moonshot thinking” to harness the full potential of humanity. Benjamin Z. Houlton is the Ronald P. Lynch Dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

  • 3:00 - 4:30 p.m. A Taste of Stocking Hall

    Location: Stocking Hall
    Stocking Hall is just over half a mile from Statler Hall, a pleasant (flat terrain) walk on Tower Road. In addition, Peterson Parking Lot is directly across from Stocking Hall.

     

    Stocking Hall is home to our Food Science Department, world-renowned for its research and development of new ideas in wine, dairy, and apples. Enjoy a tour of the facility, while sampling Cornell ice cream, Big Red Cheddar and Finger Lakes wines.

  • Enjoy the evening with your student!

    Explore Ithaca and campus with your student

Sunday, March 5, 2023

  • 8:30 - 10:30 a.m. Big Red Breakfast with Cornell Athletics: The Science That Fuels Performance

    Location: Hall of Fame Room, Friends Hall

     

    Join Big Red Athletics for breakfast with Dr. Nicki Moore, Meakem Smith Director of Athletics and Physical Education, followed by an exclusive look at the performance technology available at Cornell for elite athletes and beyond.
    • 8:30-9:15 am - Breakfast with remarks by Dr. Nicki Moore
    • 9:15 am – Depart for tour of athletic facilities