Alan’s Monday Message for July 24th
Good Monday morning, Aggies! For the first two days of last week, I was in Davis, CA attending an American Public Land Grant Universities (APLU) Chief Academic Affairs meeting at UC-Davis. On Sunday, there was a session devoted to New Provosts that I attended. From Monday through Tuesday, there were a variety of sessions on everything from academic freedom and free speech to legislative updates to supporting a post-pandemic multi-generational academic workforce to countering the negative perceptions of the value of public higher education. I was able to meet new Provost colleagues and discuss how we can collaborate better and brainstorm solutions to similar challenges we are all facing. Most of the Provosts are struggling with the same issues (i.e., faculty morale, culture, having faculty return to campus, building community).
On Wednesday, I had a number of 1:1 meetings and I attended a meeting with Joe Lakey, Phil Post, Daniel James, and James McAteer to review the current waitlist for fall courses. I encouraged them to add courses now if they are confident, they will fill or increase to a sufficient level. I understand the longer we wait to add courses, the more difficult it is to find instructors to teach those courses, so I prefer we make educated calculations now rather than scramble at the last minute. Participating in this process has clearly brought into focus our need to review how we schedule courses (day and time). We cannot depend on the traditional methods of relying on last year’s schedule and faculty preference to dictate course scheduling. This is student unfriendly and creates conflicts and hampers our student’s ability to register for the courses they need to progress through their academic programs. In the afternoon, I met with VP for EID, Linda Scholz, Jerry Nevarez, and Angela Velasco to discuss affirmative action strategies for faculty searches. They are going to lead orientations for search committees to better attract more diverse and stronger applicant pools.
For Thursday, I had a number of 1:1 meetings in the morning. I drove to Farm and Ranch with James McAteer to have lunch and be part of a panel with DACC Chancellor Monica Torres on how education interfaces with workforce and economic development in front of the Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce. I met NMSU football coach, Jerry Kill for the first time. He is an impressive leader and I invited him to meet with the academic leadership team to share how he creates a cohesive team mentality. After lunch, I returned to the office and attended the University Program Approval Committee (UPAC) meeting before finishing my day with administrative duties.
On Friday, I attended a special Board of Regents meeting. The Regents heard and subsequently approved a ICT network infrastructure funding proposal presented by Thomas Bunton. Afterwards, I met with US Consul General to Juarez, Mexico, Eric Cohan to discuss increasing student exchanges and preparing interested students to go into Foreign service. He invited us to visit the Consulate in Juarez in the fall. After lunch, I attended a CADRe meeting (this is the group of Associate Deans for research from every college led by VPR Luis Cifuentes and AVPR Alisha Giron). After exchanging thoughts on research, I attended a meeting about faculty summer salary compensation. For the rest of the day, I did administrative work.
During this week, I worked on a document that all the Deans contributed to about creating the cultural norms and expectations we expect of each other. We have a way to go before it can be shared publicly, but once it is completed, it will appear in an upcoming Monday message to see what the Deans and I have agreed to hold ourselves accountable to. Hopefully, this will inspire departments and other units across campus about how we need to treat others and raise the expectations for everyone’s behavior. This is one small part of a greater effort to improve the campus culture and climate.
NMSU’s Unsung Heroes
This week, I received one recipient for being NMSU Unsung Heroes.
Jimi Ickes (Program Operations Director for Undergraduate Studies in College of Engineering) – As Associate Dean David Jauregui noted, Jimi is a true Aggie with an Associate degree in Pre-Business, Bachelor’s degree in Economics and Master’s degree in Criminal Justice from NMSU. She currently manages the student-centric activities in the Eloy Torrez Family Engineering Learning Communities (ELC) such as tutoring services, exam reviews & proctoring, supplemental instruction, and capstone design presentations. In addition, Jimi arranges for industry representatives to meet with students and provide career guidance in the ELC and she co-advises the NMSU Engineering Student Council. She also helps organize the COE’s Order of the Engineer and Sociedad de Ingenieros ceremony for graduating bachelor, master, and Ph.D. students in the fall and spring semesters. Through prior positions Jimi has held at NMSU, she also has brought experience in other areas including admissions, degree certifications, graduate studies, scholarships, advising, and undergraduate research, to name a few. Overall, Jimi brings a wealth of knowledge to the COE and we are fortunate to have her in the college! Thank you, Jimi, for what you do for COE students!
Kudos
As Associate Provost, Tara Gray shared, Dr. Michaela Burkardt, Physics, has achieved a remarkable feat as a Digital Faculty Fellow in charge of the ACUE course in Effective Online Teaching Practices. Under her guidance, and that of the Academy’s Educational Specialist, Theresa Remacle, 30 out of 33 individuals successfully completed the course. This completion rate exceeds the rate of the past two cohorts and is a testament not only to Michaela's ability to guide and encourage cohort members, but also to the cohort's perseverance through the 25 modules that compromised this intensive, year-long course. Congratulations, one and all!
Last Monday, Rebecca Campbell shared with me that Dr. Erik Lehnhoff was recognized as a hero by Mayor of Las Cruces Ken Miyagishima for his service on the Organ Mountain Technical Rescue Squad (a volunteer group) which recently rescued a group of hikers off of the Needles in the Organ Mountains. Erik is a faculty member in ACES in the Department of Entomology, Plant Pathology, and Weed Science. Congratulations Erik for modeling for everyone what a good citizen does to help others!
