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Pace University is charging into the future.

We’ve made it through the pandemic. We’re building a bold new vision to move us forward. We’re planning new buildings and up-to-date new living, learning, and community spaces. And we’re creating a new look and feel for the University’s brand.

A university is always changing, but this feels like an especially pivotal moment.

Last month, we said farewell to the brave and bold Class of 2021. We’re getting ready to welcome the Class of 2025 this fall—and we’re on track for record-setting enrollment numbers. We’ll be moving back to fully in-person learning and living, counting down till we once again have bustling residence halls and vibrant campuses.

We’re finalizing our new Strategic Plan, which will guide Pace as we renew our commitment to being the premiere outcomes-focused institution in the New York region, preparing our students for lifelong success as leaders and changemakers.

We’re building our values of diversity, equity, and inclusion into everything we do, and we’re ensuring our new Strategic Plan reflects that priority.

We’re marching ahead with our campus transformations, planning for 15 Beekman Street and new, state-of-the-art spaces for our performing and creative arts in New York City, a new Healthcare Hub for training our College of Health Professions students in Pleasantville, and much more.

Of course, change also means that some things come to an end. After 28 years leading—and revolutionizing—what was once the Leinhard School of Nursing and since 2010 has been the College of Health Professions, Dean Harriet Feldman is stepping down from her role. We’re incredibly appreciative of all she has done for Pace.

Change is coming to the Board of Trustees, too. On July 1, Trustee Rob Sands, an alumnus of the Elisabeth Haub School of Law, will become our new board chair. He takes the role after my eight-year term comes to an end. I’ve enjoyed serving Pace, and I look forward to supporting Rob as I remain a trustee.

Marvin and I are both proud of how well our University fared through the pandemic. That success was thanks to the hard work and commitment of everyone in our Pace Community. Now, we’re building on that success to build a strong and thriving future. We’ll continue to do what we’ve always done: create life-changing opportunities for our students.

Onward,

Marvin Krislov
President

Mark M. Besca ’81
Chairman of the
Board of Trustees

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After nearly two years of research; evaluation; drafting; and input from Pace students, faculty, staff, and alumni, Pace has created a new brand platform, and with it, a new expression of what it means to be part of the Pace Community. In partnership with our branding agency, Mindpower, we’ve created a new branding platform with the following objectives:

• To develop a distinctive, compelling, and cohesive brand identity;
• Provide a platform that supports the overall goals of the University; and
• Enhance consistency of messaging throughout your time at Pace, from prospective student to current student to alumni.

The brand strategy, borne out of the research, is to solidify and advance Pace’s position as a leader in creating opportunity through its strong academics, exceptional experiential learning offerings, and dedicated advising. The new branding platform empowers Pace to communicate these messages while celebrating the strong shared sense of optimism and ‘can-do’ spirit within our community.

Our new wordmark is a highly visible aspect of the branding initiative—you’ve likely already started to see this new wordmark replace the old “swoosh” logo. Simple and straightforward, the new Pace wordmark is bold, optimistic, simple, and unembellished.

In addition to the wordmark, we’ve begun introducing new messaging and visual designs within our new brand platform, including new web design (you're in it right now!), videos, banners, and signs. You’ll also see new stories about students, faculty, and alumni using this new design, not to mention updated emails and much more. This is an exciting time to be part of the Pace Community!

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A Pace University film class—made up of 20 graduate and undergraduate students from around the country—was set to embark on a trip to Paris, France, last spring to produce a documentary on urban beekeeping and spotlight the rooftop bees that survived the historic Cathedral of Notre Dame fire.

Passports were secured. Tickets were booked. And all of the groundwork and arduous pre-production work, including setting up interviews and securing location approvals, were complete for a week-long shoot overseas. For many of these students, it would be a working Spring Break unlike most others.

But that was March 2020.

Weeks prior to the scheduled departure, the global pandemic ensured all international travel came to a halt, and the University, like most others around the world, immediately pivoted to remote learning.

The disappointment was real. The frustration palpable. But it was also short-lived, as these filmmakers—known as the PaceDocs Team—knew the show must go on.

Professor Maria Luskay, EDd, whose “Producing the Documentary” course is part of the Department of Media, Communications, and Visual Arts on Pace’s Pleasantville Campus, is a highly-regarded program, garnering over 34 prestigious film festival awards to date. (She’s been teaching the class for more than 20 years.)

“The experience I had was invaluable,” said Austin Braun, a graduate student. “We had a special experience. We learned how to produce a film online. We learned that we can make a powerful film with all of the technology we have… It’s the future of filmmaking.”

Professor Luskay (also the showrunner, or director), assisted by Professor Lou Guarneri, scrambled and came up with “Plan Bee.” They dispatched this group of budding filmmakers to beekeepers closer to home—New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts.

Now, roughly a year after the initial setback and long after their class had ended, the PaceDoc Team’s film premiered on April 22, 2021—Earth Day.

“The experience I had was invaluable,” said Austin Braun, a graduate student from Stockholm, New Jersey. “We had a special experience. We learned how to produce a film online. We learned that we can make a powerful film with all of the technology we have… It’s the future of filmmaking.”

While it may very well be a sign of things to come in the industry, getting there was no small accomplishment. In addition to finding new locations to film and experts to speak with over the summer, the class had to learn how to edit together while working remotely across the region.

“We worked our tails off,” Braun added. “Through hard work and determination, we got it done.”

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When Christine Suddeth ’21 enrolled in the Pace School of Performing Arts as a musical theater student, she was in the midst of recovering from a voice injury—one that her voice teacher, PPA Professor Amanda Flynn, helped her recover from. Her injury and subsequent recovery lead her down a path of research and investigation.

When Christine Suddeth ’21 enrolled in the Pace School of Performing Arts as a musical theater student, she was in the midst of recovering from a voice injury—one that her voice teacher, PPA Professor Amanda Flynn, helped her recover from.

“I suffered a voice injury in high school and went through a hard recovery process. When I came to Pace, Amanda helped me rehabilitate and get me back to where I was—and further,” said Christine.

Several years later, as she began to conduct her honors thesis, an opportunity came around for Christine to channel that experience for the better—Flynn had emailed a select group of students inviting them to apply to the Provost’s Undergraduate Student Faculty Research program. Sensing an opportunity to broaden her undergraduate experience, Christine immediately went for it—one email later, and Flynn and Christine started brainstorming potential topics.

“I have a published paper in the Journal of Voice looking at vocal health in undergraduate performing arts training programs—looking at how we teach vocal health, is it effective, are students able to navigate through their performing careers—this survey study left a lot of questions,” said Flynn. “Christine got excited at looking at the student experience going through a very intense, fast-paced BFA program coming in injured. We crafted this survey study looking at the student experience—what was it actually like to be injured in school. Christine is also a psychology minor, so this was a nice tie-in.”

Flynn and Christine developed a thorough survey study, and with considerable effort to find an adequate sample size of individuals who fit into the research category, were able to analyze and synthesize the responses to the study. The duo hopes that their findings—which will be more widely displayed through presentations at both the NCUR and the Voice Foundation, and potentially a published paper—will be used to better educate voice teachers, universities, students, and faculty as to how to best manage a vocal injury.

“Doing this research opened my mind a bit more—as a performing arts major, you can get tunnel vision,” said Christine. “It was liberating in a way that I could expand my breadth of study.”

“I’m grateful that Pace has such an initiative to get undergraduate involved in research because I think it’s a really fulfilling experience,” said Flynn. “You learn a lot, and it opens people’s minds that there’s more out their than what they’ve been doing for the last four years.”