Meet the Administrators:
Q&A with Acting Provost Aaron Ettenberg
Q. What are your responsibilities at UCSB? What are the main units for which
you are responsible? How do your administrative responsibilities affect
undergraduates at UCSB?
A. The term "provost" was originally used by the French to
describe he who is the keeper of the keys to the prison! Obviously, one could
easily draw some amusing and perhaps interesting analogies from this fact, but
fortunately the word has evolved in more recent times to mean "a senior-level
administrative officer in a college or university." As provost here at UCSB,
I serve as the Chief Financial (think "budgets") and Academic (think "
curriculum") Officer of the College of Letters and Science (L&S). As you may
already know, L&S is the third largest college in the entire University of
California system and is far and away the largest academic entity at UCSB,
encompassing over 85% of the students and faculty on the campus. Virtually
all matters affecting an L&S student’s academic life are administered through
the college’s various divisions. For example, the division of Student Academic
Affairs assesses your progress to degree, ensures that you are appropriately
fulfilling the appropriate course requirements, and provides or coordinates
a wide number of educationally enriching experiences such as the honors program,
UCDC, the Freshman Seminar series, and numerous student research programs.
They are the folks you see for General Education (GE) and general course
advising, for progress-to-degree checks, and to petition for exceptions to
academic policies, like late drops and changes in grading options. Your more
specific disciplinary needs, like those pertaining to your major or minor, are
handled under the auspices of three broad academic divisions — Mathematical,
Life, and Physical Sciences; Social Sciences; and Humanities and Fine Arts.
Each division includes all the various academic departments whose faculty offer
the courses that students take as electives, major or GE requirements. Our goal,
then, is to take this rather large monster called "The College" and break it
up into administratively smaller chunks intended to help provide you, the
students, with as much of a "small college" experience as we can!
Q. In which department are you a faculty member? How long have you been
there? Which undergraduate classes have you taught? Do you have a favorite
and if so what do you especially like about teaching that class?
A. UCSB was my very first (and only) academic professorial
position! I earned my Ph.D in psychopharmacology from McGill University in
Montreal, Canada, in the spring of 1980. My wife and I then moved to San Diego,
where I had two exciting years of postdoctoral experience while a member of
the scientific staff at the Salk Institute in La Jolla. Then in 1982 I came
to UCSB as a spanking new assistant professor in the Department of Psychology.
I remain a member of my home department and continue to teach and do research
there despite my rather significant administrative responsibilities as head
of the college. Over the years I have taught undergraduate classes in Animal
Learning (lecture and lab courses) , Biopsychology, Motivation, and Brain and
Behavior. But the highlight for me occurred just a couple of years ago when,
for the first time in my career, I taught Psych 1! It was the most time-
consuming, most pressure-packed, most exhausting and far and away the most fun
teaching experience that I have ever had, and I look forward to teaching it
again in the years ahead. I remember very, very clearly my own Intro Psych
class as a freshman in Canada — the instructor was great, the material was
fascinating, and I was hooked! So it was a kick for me, these many years later,
to try and convey to a new generation of students some of the enthusiasm and
excitement that I felt and continue to feel for psychology. I love to teach,
but Psych 1 was special for me, and hopefully some of that energy somehow got
conveyed to my students.
Q. Can you tell us about your own undergraduate experience? Where were you
a student? Were you always committed to being an academic in your discipline
or did you have other plans? What or who was influential in your undergraduate
career? Did you go straight from undergraduate to graduate school?
A. I was an undergraduate student at Concordia University
in Canada. Back then (in the 1970s) it was a small school (certainly relative
to UCSB) with upper-division classes that rarely exceeded 50 students in size
and many seminars with fewer than 20 students. Upon entering my junior year,
I applied for and was accepted into the psychology honors program. We were a
pretty select group of about only 15 students per year and they worked us
pretty hard. In addition to our regular major requirements, we had to take a
set of four honors classes (two seminars and two lab courses) plus complete a
year-long research-based honors thesis in our senior year. Each of my classes
ran through the complete academic year (quite a contrast to UCSB’s 10-week
quarter system!), so we got to learn a great deal more about far fewer topics
than do students here at UC. The most influential experience for me was
without a doubt the honors thesis work that I did in the laboratory of my
mentor — Professor Roy Wise. It was a pharmacology lab, and I got to work
side-by-side with the graduate students, lab assistants, and post-docs as well
spend a great deal of time with Dr. Wise himself. This was an experience that
I simply could never have obtained in a lecture hall or classroom laboratory.
I learned everything hands-on — from lab methods to "real" statistics, from
writing papers to presenting my research in a public forum. It was an amazing
honors program. I attended professional conferences with "the team," learned
an enormous amount of technical and conceptual material, and eventually had
the honor of getting my own thesis research published in a scientific journal.
So for me, the desire to continue on to graduate school and move toward an
eventual research/teaching job in academia was pretty clear by the time I
finished my junior year. I finished my B.S. in 1975, and immediately entered
the Ph.D. program at McGill University in the fall of that same year. I have
never regretted any aspect of the educational path that brought me to my
current place at UCSB or my current position as provost of the College of
Letters and Science.
Q. Can you describe your research? What do you enjoy about it? Have your
academic directions refocused over the years?
A. My research involves an investigation into the brain
mechanisms that underlie the behavioral actions of drugs of abuse. Why are
drugs like cocaine or heroin or marijuana self-administered by humans? Where
in the nervous system do these drugs act, and how do they do so? What is the
biological basis of addiction, and can the addictive process be prevented or
reversed? These are the questions that enthralled me an undergraduate honors
student, and these remain the important questions that I continue to grapple
with all these years later. My students and I have learned a great deal over
the years about how the brain processes rewarding signals, but there remains
much to be learned and understood and I continue to be excited by this field
of inquiry.
Q. Do you have some advice for honors undergraduates at UCSB?
A. I have one very simple piece of advice to you honors
undergraduates: get involved in a faculty member’s research as soon as
possible in your undergraduate career. Whether it’s working as a volunteer or
doing an Independent Studies 199 Project, get involved! There are many places
where you can get a quality undergraduate classroom education. There are
lectures to hear and books to read, and these can be had anywhere. But what
makes a world-class research university like UCSB so great for students is the
opportunity the campus provides for you to get involved in research. To be a
part of the creative or discovery process alongside some of the world’s most
renowned scholars, artists, and scientists. There is only so much one can
learn from books. Doing research can expose you to ideas and information that
won’t even make it to the textbooks for another 3-5 years. It can provide you
with a whole new set of skills and a far deeper appreciation for and
understanding of the material that you’ve been reading about. As honors
students at UCSB, you have the opportunity to stand beside our faculty and
graduate students at the cutting edge of your respective disciplines. And it's
there for the taking, so step forward and get involved!
Q. Can you tell us about the Provost's Honors Council?
A. The Provost's Honors council is a select group of
students who meet once each quarter with me, the provost, to talk about
issues of interest to you (the students) and to provide a glimpse of campus
life that you would not otherwise get exposed to. My goal is to have a bright,
motivated, and dedicated group of students from whom I can seek input on student-
related matters (e.g., should we change our GE system and if so how? Should
the university take a more active role in curbing undesirable behavior in IV?)
and with whom I can share some of what goes on behind the scenes on campus.
For example, last year we had a glimpse of the newly adopted long-range plan
for the campus and shared the architectural depictions of what the UCSB campus
will look like a decade from now. In the spring, the official carilloneur of
the University of Michigan visited with us and provides a historical overview
of the development of the carillon — a keyboard instrument that controls the
striking of the bells in university and church towers throughout the world —
and then were treated to a concert atop Storke Tower as a tune-up for
Commencement). My goal is for these quarterly meetings to be informative and
enjoyable. You might think of the Provost’s Honors Council as a bit of
payback — a small reward for all the hard work and long hours that you have
devoted to your studies while at UCSB.
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