By Peter Lee

It’s been a great honor—not to mention a lot of fun—to serve on the Board of Directors of the Computing Research Association. My participation on the board has been truly fulfilling, in large part because the importance of CRA to the computing research community has grown markedly in recent years, and also because of the many great colleagues I’ve met along the way. Now, as the Board Chair, I have come to understand fully how much CRA has accomplished in recent years and how many great opportunities it has to make a difference for the community. I think we really have a bright future ahead of us.

All of this, of course, has made my recent decision to resign from the CRA Board all the more difficult. I will be leaving my position as Board Chair, as well as taking a leave from my faculty appointment at Carnegie Mellon University, to start a two-year stint at Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). As a new office director at DARPA, my new job will be to create new opportunities for research, thereby strengthening both the research community and our nation’s defense. Of course, I am also hoping that I will be able to contribute to DARPA’s desire to strengthen its ties with academic researchers. Indeed, my appointment to this post is at least one sign that DARPA is serious about this.

The decision to do this was difficult for me. I have been truly happy and proud to be the CRA Board Chair and I am very excited by the many opportunities that lie ahead for CRA. We are able to engage in an incredibly impressive range of important advocacy activities. Unfortunately, since part of CRA’s advocacy involves working with funding agencies to help foster programs for funding computing research, it is necessary for me to step down. By the time this issue of CRN hits the presses, the Board, led by its Executive Committee, will have selected a new Board Chair.

Although I have presided over just one meeting of the Board, I have appreciated all of the support from Board members and other members of the research community. And while I won’t be on the CRA Board any longer, I am still as dedicated as ever to service to the community—it’s just in a slightly different capacity now. I’m sure that many of you will be hearing from me.