Research has shown that new year’s resolutions are often lessons in futility. In a recent blog post in Inside Higher Education, the following questions were posed to readers: What are you saying yes to in 2022? What are you letting go of? What were your big wins in 2021? Regrets? What are your intentions for 2022? What do you want to focus on? Is there a word or phrase that sums it up for you?

Respondents focused on a word and explained how this word grounded their perspective for the new year. I shared the post with my Weingarten Center colleagues and asked them to add their responses. Here is my response to the prompt:

My word is "promise." Even though we are still in the thick of COVID, global warming, and political bickering, I still hold fast to the ideal that we can work together to preserve our planet, to be good citizens of the community, and to be catalysts for change.