Raymond J. Webb, PhD
Director of Student Life for the Health Sciences Center (HSC), Office of Student Life,
Division of Student Affairs
Start Date: October 15, 2024
When Ray Webb saw the job description for a brand-new position in Student Life at Stony Brook University’s Health Sciences Center (HSC), he knew right away it epitomized everything he wanted to accomplish in his career, and his life. And it suited his experience to a ‘T’.
“I was like, this is a phenomenal opportunity at the big SUNY institution right here in my hometown of Long Island. And here I am … so happy to be a Seawolf!”
Ray’s enthusiasm is not only contagious, it’s squarely directed to his single-overriding goal: helping students. In his new position, he serves as program advisor to more than 100 student clubs and organizations and is tasked with bringing Seawolf spirit to the more than 4,000 students at the HSC. He also helps students ranging from undergrad to post-doctoral – studying in fields ranging from physical therapy, to dentistry, to respiratory care and social welfare – navigate complex and changing educational and campus policies, plan events that complement the academic mission of Stony Brook University, help students tackle their own academic pursuits, and more.
“The students in the HSC are enrolled in the most rigorous academic programs imaginable,” says Ray. “And they are working very hard around the clock, as they should be. They are our future practitioners and they are our future in so many ways. So it's our job to support them. And our services are meant to complement all the work they’re putting in and help them thrive and succeed.”
Ray sees special significance in the fact that this role is new, and he’s free to shape it: “This is the first time in a long time that Student Affairs has had a physical footprint here at the HSC … So it's been a big deal. What was said to me on day one is ‘You have a blank canvas and it’s your job to paint it.”
Ray is filling in that canvas working with student assistants, Student Life colleagues and partners across campus at his newly renovated office suite in the HSC. The new space, he says, was designed as a comfortable, fun area where students and student groups can come for guidance, but also to network, play games, decompress on comfy couches, and feel supported and ‘seen’ through all kinds of affirming messages on the walls.
“We want them to know this is their space. This is their home away from home. This is Student Life.”
Ray says he’s happy, too, to work across all campuses – East, West and even Southampton – to best meet student needs. “Whether it's the career center, whether it's CAPS [Counseling and Psychological Services], whatever they need, we can be that kind of resource for them in bridging Student Affairs to their academic life.”
While Ray himself started his college career at the State University of New York at Albany with a Political Science degree and the ambition to become either a social studies teacher or a lawyer, some encounters of the best kind with student affairs professionals and mentors changed his course. What followed were Master’s and Doctoral degrees in Educational Policy from UAlbany. And what followed that was more than a decade of working at both his alma mater upstate and Hofstra University in both the student affairs and academic affairs worlds and, in particular, health sciences.
Explaining his own trajectory, Ray says, “I got involved as an undergraduate in student government. I was a student leader at UAlbany for a long time. And it was through that experience that I met student affairs professionals that were not only helpful, but became mentors for me. I never knew going into college that you could work in that field. So I had met these phenomenal individuals who I still am in contact with to this day, and they really inspired me to pursue a career in higher education.”
Paying it forward now, Ray claims, “It's mostly that student interaction that I love the most about my day. Whether it's the clubs and organizations that we work with or student leaders that are in the Dean's councils, we’re working to carry out their vision for what they want Student Life to be, and do, here in this building.” As part of outreach and awareness about new Student Life services at HSC, “We hold ‘Health Hub Hangouts’, for example, where we give out candy, play games, do activities, blend student life and academics. It’s one of our more creative and fun ways to promote Seawolf spirit, and it catches a lot of attention.”
Ray says there are also ongoing public health discussions, lecture series and more, which he works to spread the word about. He works, too, to bring together “all of our stakeholders – dental medicine, public health, nutrition, medicine, social welfare, health professions and nursing. We feel that we can be that bridge for everybody to come together and to do that extracurricular networking and leadership development, which is our bread and butter.”
These activities – plus the new Student Life space – are all ways, he says, “to introduce the HSC and Student Life here, the vibrancy here, even to students currently on West Campus who may pursue graduate degrees at the HSC later on.”
When he’s not ‘on the job,’ Ray is a self-described foodie who loves cooking, as well as eating some of the simple cuisine he missed while living upstate for 10 years (“you know you really miss your bagels, you miss your pizza, you miss your Chinese food, all the diverse cuisines we have here on Long Island. It’s just all so good down here!”). He also enjoys watching and talking about his favorite shows, like Game of Thrones and Survivor, for which he was looking forward to the start of season 50 as of this writing.
Overall, Ray says he’s “thrilled” to be living back on Long Island with his “best friend” and wife, Danielle, who he met up in Albany but is also a native Long Islander and also works in higher ed. They recently bought a house in Smithtown, with Ray having been born and bred in Farmingdale (“Go Dalers!”). Two cats called Lily and Franklin (named in honor of historical figures Queen Elizabeth II and Franklin D. Roosevelt) reside with them in their happy home.