Alan’s Monday Message for September 25th
Good Monday morning Aggies. Fall has arrived with cooler morning temperatures and slowly moderating highs. This past week started with me attending the Autumn Overture in Atkinson Recital Hall on Sunday afternoon. As you can see the choir, jazz ensemble, and the Mariachi band and Folkorico dancers were part of the hour long performance along with a piano soloist, Philharmonic orchestra, wind symphony, and the Pride of New Mexico marching band. On Monday morning I attended the weekly President’s executive meeting followed by a meeting with the President’s cabinet meeting. After these meetings, I attended a disenrollment meeting. This is an issue we experienced during the summer where prior to the fall semester if students owed more than a certain amount, they were automatically disenrolled. We are reviewing this process to take whatever proactive steps we can to minimize this issue for next summer. Following this meeting, I walked up the International Mall and talked to the students manning the government table. I took the citizenship test and passed. LOL! After returning to the office and having lunch, I had a 1:1 meeting followed by another meeting with HEST Dean Yoshi Iwasaki, Chancellor Sherry Kollmann, and Chief of Staff Leslie Cervantes to review HEST’s online programs.
Tuesday was filled with 1:1 meetings. In the afternoon, I walked to Branson Library to tour their new podcast room and Emerging Technologies Learning Lab. It was very impressive. The lab has 12 stations in it with a 3-D printer and other high tech tools. I got to sample the virtual reality (VR) simulator and see inside a human body. It was an interesting experience using VR. After returning to the office, I met with the commencement committee, who runs our graduation ceremonies to learn about the preparations for December's ceremony. I want to thank Gabrielle Martinez for her past leadership of graduation commencement and I look forward to Analyssa Martinez's leadership to make the event memorable for our graduating students and their families. After this, I walked to the Science Hall with President Gogue to meet with the Department of Psychology.
On Wednesday morning, I participated in the Town Hall meeting at the Corbett Center Auditorium with President Gogue. Approximately 175 attended the town hall in person and another 300 participated online. We enjoyed sharing information what the campus community After the town hall meeting, I attended the bi-weekly meeting with the academic associate deans and James McAteer to continue our examination of operational processes we can improve. After this meeting, I walked with Ayana Pai (the graduate student shadowing me) to Rentfrow Hall to participate in the HEST Hoopla for their students. It was an extremely well-attended event with tables by various organizations and food for everyone to enjoy. My kudos go out to all the HEST leaders/faculty/staff for putting on a great event to support their students. Following this, I returned to Hadley Hall to work on administrative duties prior to meeting with Diana Molina-Barragan to review the Provost's budget with James McAteer. Diana gave James and I and update on the Provost's budget. Unbeknownst to me, there were prior commitments to the Provost's budget preceding my arrival, so I don't have much discretionary funding. Diana will be giving me my final budget for this year when the funds are released in the next few weeks. Regardless, the Provost's office is accepting funding requests from academic affairs units up until October 1st. All funding requests must be processed through their respective department head and dean's office prior to submission to the Provost's Office.
To start Thursday, I attended a meeting of people I pulled to together to examine the issue of open access resources to charge them with reviewing and making a recommendation for how NMSU should incorporate open access resource and to see its viability. One of our goals is to minimize the cost of textbooks and materials to students without sacrificing academic integrity. After this meeting, I had a 1:1 meeting before lunch. One of the responsibilities I take great pride in is grooming the next generation of academic leaders. I was fortunate to have a Provost at UTSA who saw something and mentored me along my journey and I feel it is my responsibility to pay it forward. As I have shared with the Deans, I want them to be grooming future leaders at NMSU as a form of intentional succession planning. In higher education, we tend not be very good at succession planning, so in case of an emergency, I want us to have viable leaders who can take over the reins at a moment's notice if need be and can be viable candidates for future opportunities. At mid-day, the electricity went off for most of campus. It took about 90 minutes to restore power. We canceled the 12pm and 1pm classes, but all other courses resumed afterwards. Later in the afternoon, I attended the UPAC meeting in O'Donnell Hall. We reviewed six academic programs. Afterwards, I attended a meet and greet session iwth the new Las Cruces Public Schools (LCPS) Superintendent Ignacio Ruiz at La Posta with Senior Associate Provost James McAteer and HEST Dean Yoshi Iwasaki. I sense there are great opportunities to strengthen and expand our relationships with LCPS.
On Friday Morning, I attended the Aggie Welcome and Orientation (AWO) meeting to review and see how we can improve the AWO experience for students and families. I appreciated the group’s positive willingness to examine the AWO experience and adapt as need be to improving it. Following this meeting, I attended the first Department Head meeting of the year in Fulton Center with James McAteer leading the meeting. We had approximately 40 Department Heads participate. I want to thank all the Department Heads for their commitment to serve their colleagues. Arguably, it is one of the most challenging leadership positions in the university. Our goal in the Provost’s office is to develop and support our Department Heads, so they can be successful and experience satisfaction and fulfillment in their job responsibilities. Following the Department Head meeting, I was invited to attend the ACES Leadership luncheon. Afterwards, I drove to Fabian Garcia Research Center and walked around the facility with Dave Lowry. I will be returning to Fabian Garcia to participate in their Field Day on October 11th. Later in the afternoon, I attended the Department of Engineering Technology and Surveying meeting.
Announcement – Changes in Indian Resources Development (IRD)
On August 29th, Dr. Claudia Trueblood submitted her letter of resignation to the position of Director of Indian Resources Development at NMSU. She has accepted a position with the New Mexico Environment Department under the Office of Strategic Initiatives, a position more closely associated with her PhD specialization in water. Claudia’s last day with NMSU will be October 5, 2023. If you know or have worked with Claudia, please reach out to her and thank her for her commitment to NMSU. We appreciate the work that Dr. Trueblood has done in the college in restructuring the Dean’s office and in revitalizing IRD, a valuable economic development program for tribal nations in New Mexico. Mrs. Cherylin Atcitty has been named interim director as of September 18th. Cherylin, a member of the Navajo Nation, is originally from Bodaway/Gap and currently resides in Taos, New Mexico. Cherylin has a B.S. in Biology with a minor in Chemistry from Oklahoma Panhandle State University and a M.S. in environmental science from West Texas A&M University. Her background includes working with tribes in New Mexico in natural resource management, air quality, wildlife, fire, surface water, renewable energy, agriculture, and entrepreneurship. IRD will now be under the economic development unit of ACES, led by Dr. Jay Lillywhite. We wish Dr. Trueblood and Mrs. Atcitty the best in her respective endeavors.
Announcement – Upcoming bi-weekly meeting for NMSU Leaders
After five months on the job, one insight I have learned about NMSU is we are often our own worst enemy. Many times, it seems like the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. For NMSU to improve, we must address this issue head on by learning and understanding what our various operations are doing, prior to making premature judgments. After vetting an idea across several groups (people in the Provost office, the Executive and Cabinet meetings this past week), starting sometime in October, I am organizing bi-weekly topic meetings for NMSU leaders to learn and better understand how other operations across the institution work. Each session, one group will present an overview of their unit’s operation with only three powerpoint slides maximum. Each group will be allotted thirty minutes to share their unit’s operations and then the other thirty minutes will be devoted to conversation and constructive input. To date, I have identified over 50 operations for presentations. I asked VP for Student Success, Renay Scott to lead off by sharing what the Division of Student Success is doing to advance student retention/success. Justin Bannister of Marketing and Communication has committed to sharing a summary of each meeting through our media venues. It is time to turn the corner on our culture and climate and these regular meetings are one method to advance greater understanding and improvement of our operations.
NMSU’s Unsung Heroes
his week, I received two recipients for being NMSU Unsung Heroes.
Madison Cammarata (Student Co-op PSL IT and ISOC) – As Greg Cooper (ISOC Manager/ISSM) shared, Madison looks like every other student you see on campus. Going to her classes, studying, then trying to juggle in part time work at the Physical Science Laboratory, Madison still maintains good grades. She has worked her way through DACC to being a full-time student at NMSU main campus studying Cybersecurity in Computer Science. At the same time Madison is a single mom of an elementary school daughter. But life didn’t think that would be challenging enough, so it took her hearing at a young age. Even with her hearing aids, voices are often muffled. She has to read most textbooks twice because the lectures are not lectures. She is the unsung hero to her daughter and an inspiration to all of those who witness her diligence. So, the next time you see Madison in the halls of PSL, just say “you are not unsung.”
Dr. Frannie Miller (Assistant Professor in Department of Agricultural Economics and Agricultural Business) – As Kirsten Holles wrote, I wanted to pass on some information for an unsung hero that was included in an email I received Sunday evening from a concerned parent. Her student is struggling with their transition to NMSU and had gone home for the State Fair. While home, the student had shared they didn’t want to come back to campus. Luckily for NMSU, while at the State Fair, the student met Dr. Frannie Miller from the College of ACES. Dr. Miller spoke with the student about their concerns and together they created a plan. The mother was so grateful her student had not only reached out to Dr. Miller, but that Dr. Miller really listened and thought about how she could help the student find a place at NMSU that may encourage them to stay. These are the little things that are done on a regular basis but we don’t always hear about. I suspect Dr. Miller was just doing this because this is what we do when we care about the students at NMSU. I wanted to reach out and let you know how much a parent appreciated NMSU. This is a great example of what President Gogue has shared. It only takes one adult to care and intervene in a student’s life to make a difference between success and failure. Thank you Dr. Miller for your caring spirit to help this student.
