Alan's Monday Message for October 16th

Good morning Aggies. I started last week with Cherylin Atcitty, Interim Director of Indian Resource Development sending me a picture of herself in traditional clothing to celebrate Indigenous People's Day. As Cherylin shared with me, "The ribbon skirt is worn to show the connection between Mother Earth and myself. Growing up I was told that the color green symbolized knowledge, that it must be nurtured daily to grow and flourish. I am wearing a squash blossom necklace because it reminds me of my grandmothers who were both sheep herders. I later learned that this is called natural resource management, the field I choose for my profession also. The buffalo moccasins I am wearing remind me to be resilient and a problem solver."

Subsequently, I had a teams meeting with New Mexico State Demographer, Robert Rhatigan and his analyst, Dr. Jacqueline A. Miller, Ph.D. from the University of New Mexico. We are in the process of scheduling a day and time for them to come and present at NMSU to the wider community sometime after the new year. The information they will provide will illustrate the challenges of the demographic cliff for K-12 public schools and higher education as well as the state at large. It will also show the implications for our aging population and New Mexico's economy if the status quo continues and nothing significantly changes. Following this meeting, I attended the President's weekly executive meeting. Afterwards, I attended the waitlist bi-weekly meeting with the academic associate deans. The Associate Deans decided to focus on course scheduling, blocking time slots, and classroom assignment protocols to provide a more student friendly schedule given the limited amount of time slots available during a Monday through Thursday time schedule. Afterwards, I had several 1:1 meetings including one with Steve Stochaj, Department Head of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Steve asked me to participate with Wave the Wonder Dog on a television promotion during homecoming festivities to showcase Wave and NMSU as part of an American Kennel Club (AKC) promotion on ESPN. It should be fun and I look forward to talking about Wave and what he means to NMSU fans. Later on, I attended to administrative duties for the rest of the day.

On Tuesday, I had a number of 1:1 meetings before the Deans only bi-weekly meeting. We discussed five things from budget requests to college annual reports to P/T draft timeline to web accessibility to discussing an ARP. In the afternoon, I had more 1:1 and small group meetings.

To start Wednesday, I attended the Fabian Garcia Field Day. I want to thank Dave Lowry and Lara Prihodko and their respective teams for organizing the Field Day. I welcomed attendees prior to a tour of the facility. If you have not attended a Field Day, especially at Leyendecker or Fabian Garcia for Las Cruces folks, I highly recommend one in the future. It is truly amazing to hear about the research they are doing and products they are producing from pecans to table grapes to grapes for in to soil research and irrigation techniques to determine the best way to utilize our water resources. Jean Hertzman, Director of School of Hotel, Restaurant and Torusim Management made and passed out a fresh grape spritzers along with a green chile pecan cake (does everything in NM have green chile in it? 😀). Following the Field Day, I drove back to campus to meet with Diana Molina-Barragan and James McAteer to review the Provost's budget. With the October 1st deadline for submitting budget requests, the Provost's office had received over $2.6M in requests. Unfortunately, due to a limited budget, the Provost's office will only be able to support a few of these requests at this time. We will hold these requests through the end of the academic year and ask the Deans to rank order in priority the requests from their college. Before lunch, I attended the Nusenda ribbon cutting at the Corbett Center Student Success Center for the new Center for Financial Capability. After lunch, I had more 1:1 meetings prior to working on administrative issues. Some of you may ask what the Provost means when he is working on administrative issues. These issues range widely and include reviewing reports, complaints, investigating ethic points submissions or e-mail requests, or preparing for upcoming meetings among some of the items I commonly deal with. No two days are alike and this what I enjoy about this job. The variety of issues I review are rarely simple. Most are complex and require consulting multiple sources to gain a fuller perspective of the issue.

Wednesday was also the last day of work for Gloria Podruchny. We will miss Gloria's friendly demeanor and attitude. The staff and others in Hadley Hall had a nice retirement luncheon for Gloria. She had requested we not do anything big. This illustrates Glroia's sens of humility and one of the many reasons we will miss her.

Thursday was devoted to 1:1 and small group meetings. Most of the day I worked on administrative duties and started preparations for upcoming events. During the late morning, I facilitated the first meeting of what I am calling Operational Learning sessions. These sessions are meant for relevant campus leaders to learn about various aspects of NMSU’s operations. The first presenter was Renay Scott in Student Success. She gave a nice overview of what Student Success is doing to improve student success metrics. We had a great turnout of about 100 people and I hope people learned something they didn’t know before.

On Friday, I attended a meeting on recruiting in Eastern New Mexico. Following this, I went to the Convention Center to participate in the New Mexico Alliance for Minority Participation (AMP) Conference. I gave welcome remarks and then helped facilitate the Advisory Board meeting until 11:30am. Afterwards, I drove to Goddard Hall and had lunch with NSF Division Director Dr. Thyagarajan Nandagopal along with President Gogue, Dean Reddi, and representatives from the College of Engineering, College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences, and Arrowhead. In the evening, I had dinner with University of New Mexico Provost James Holloway at Hacienda de Mesilla. He was here to attend the AMP conference. We exchanged thoughts and I learned about how UNM is structured and how they are addressing some of the issues we are commonly experiencing. Provost Holloway and I were invited to participate in a leadership panel for an American Kinesiology Association workshop in January 2024 in Albuquerque, so we are looking forward to sharing our thoughts and experiences with up and coming academic leaders.

NMSU's Unsung Heroes

This week, I received one recipient for being NMSU's unsung hero.

Rosa De La Torre-Burrmeister (Program Director, TRIO Upward Bound Gadsden Independent School District and Las Cruces Public Schools) - As Eli Valdez shared with me, Rosa De La Torre-­Burmeister's service to both campuses includes appointments in several departments over the course of her approximately twenty-five year career with NMSU, assisting high school, returning adults and traditional college students meet their academic potential. Rosa is an exemplary professional and leader in higher education and her professional character demonstrates the highest of ethics, fairness, integrity, compassion, equity, intelligence and drive. Additionally, Rosa has demonstrated compassion and caring through her work with her colleagues and the thousands of students she has served and impacted in a positive manner. She has worked in non-exempt and exempt positions providing administrative support to central administration, as a student affairs professional providing direct service to students and leadership service as a Director at both the DACC and NMSU campuses. In every aspect of her career, Rosa has always demonstrated a sense of humility with respect to her contributions to the NMSU system and improving the lives of the citizenry of New Mexico. She shy's-away from taking well-deserved credit or recognition by always putting the team effort and accomplishments above her individual achievements. Ms. De La Torre-Burmeister has always demonstrated the work ethic of getting the job done no matter the time and effort that it takes to ensure projects are of the highest standards that represent New Mexico State University in the best light possible while producing the work needed to improve the lives of New Mexicans.  

Ms. De La Torre-Burmeister, a first-generation college student who immigrated to the United States from Mexico and worked the fields of southern New Mexico with her family in seeking a better life free from poverty and hunger are the strengths that drive her as an exceptional individual. Rosa De La Torre­ Burmeister's work ethic is grounded in the experiences that have shaped who she is as a professional­ constantly striving to do the right thing and produce only the best. This is why in her role as the Upward Bound Director she is constantly encouraging the Program's ninety-five participants to study hard, complete a college degree and pursue careers or additional education to make the contributions necessary for our state, region and nation to be successful. The compassion, understanding and care that she models for her Program's participants is beyond. These are the reasons I nominated her as an unsung hero.

News from Alamogordo

GO Bond Request to Voters on November 7

NMSU-A’s 15-year capital GO bond was retired in August 2023. We are requesting a new 15-year, $15 million capital bond to assist with funding the following projects:

• Classroom Building - Construction of new, modern classroom building to replace a 55-year old building.
• Allied Health Building - Modernization of laboratories and equipment to support current and new programs.
• Automotive and Welding - Additional stations, improved ventilation and HVAC.
• Tays Event Center - New gym floor, renovated bleachers, new HVAC.
• HVAC Upgrades - Replace end-of-lifetime HVAC across campus.

If you live in Alamogordo, please support our GO Bond, so that we can improve our facilities and support our students and programs.

Hispanic Heritage Month

39% of our students identify as Hispanic. During Hispanic Heritage month, we offered many campus events, including a poetry reading, catered events, singing and dancing.

Quote of the Week

"There's no magic formula for great company culture. The key is just to treat your staff how you would like to be treated." - Sir Richard Branson