Thinking Big: PSU’s Comprehensive Campaign

My November blog post on philanthropy and fundraising focused on how faculty involved in these efforts can change PSU through the generous partnership of our donors. The Academic Leadership Team (ALT) has been working closely with President Wiewel and the PSU Foundation to frame the next set of ideas that will serve as the scaffolding for PSU’s Comprehensive Campaign. This campaign will be an intensive, catalyzing fundraising effort to build endowments and one-time funds to support students, faculty, and staff, as well as facilities and programmatic needs. We have yet to launch the campaign, but the building blocks are in place.

PSU Opens Two New Cultural Centers

PSU held a grand opening celebration two weeks ago for the new Pan-African Commons (PAC) and Pacific Islander, Asian and Asian American Student Centers (PIAAA). The centers were created in response to the December 2015 PSU Students of Color Speak-Out. While these centers were long overdue, the hard work and dedication of many students, staff, faculty and administrators made it possible to plan and open them in less than ten months.

The recent presidential election has brought to the forefront how important and valuable these cultural centers are in creating safe spaces for dialog, reflection and support.

Seeking Input on Final Recommendation of Advising Redesign

The PSU Academic and Advising Redesign Workgroup will present their final report and recommendations on the next steps for advising on Thursday, November 10, 10-11am and 1-2pm in SMSU, 209M. I encourage everyone interested in this topic to RSVP and attend the event and to read the report to be released at the event and subsequently posted on the Redesign Project website.

The Redesign Project is designed to increase PSU student retention and completion rates, improve the student experience, and make advising more rewarding and effective for both professional advisors and faculty.  It is intended to create a unified advising framework to increase student self-efficacy and a sense of agency, as well as improve the experiences of academic and career advisors. It aligns with PSU’s Strategic Plan, Goal #1: Elevate Student Success, Initiative #3.1: Increase advising capacity, revitalize advising systems and improve the visibility of student support services.

Launching New International Faculty Writing Program

Our multilingual faculty has shared with me the unique challenges they face in their scholarly writing. Their desire for professional development opportunities that enrich their research efforts are explicit goals in PSU’s Strategic Plan: Goal 2, 1.3, “Make professional development for all faculty a personal and institutional priority”, and 3.2, “Create opportunities for faculty and graduate students to develop and enrich their research efforts.”

While we have had a very successful Jumpstart Academic Writing Program in the Office of Academic Innovation, application of our equity lens for Goal 2 of our Strategic Plan calls for “committing internal resources to support academic, research and creative activities that diversify our scholarly portfolio and the knowledge we generate on campus.”  It is with this in mind that I charged an ad hoc committee to investigate the different approaches we could take to provide international faculty writing support.

Conducting Successful Faculty Searches

We are entering the season of faculty searches. It is one of the most important decisions a department and college make. There are many things to think about in the process: determining if a department will be conducting a search; the focus and expertise desired for the position; committee role and membership; planning for on-campus interviews and the final selection process.

Someone once told me, “the only failed search is when you hire the wrong person.” They are so right.  It is better not to make a hire than to settle for a choice just to fill a position. Doing due diligence throughout every step of the selection process can ensure we make a great hire.

Convocation 2016 Highlights and Looking Ahead

It is a tradition to start the new academic year with our Faculty and Staff Convocation (video). Faculty Senate Presiding Officer, Professor Brad Hansen, kicked off the September 21 event with a welcome speech.

He recognized the contributions of Professors Gina Greco and Bob Liebman, our most recent past presiding officers, Faculty Secretary Richard Beyler, and the approximately 60 Faculty Senators. He spoke of the recently formed task force to examine the feasibility of teaching intensive faculty ranks, the implementation of Post-Tenure Review, the newly formed Academic Quality Committee, and an adhoc committee on Liberal Education.

Professor Hansen let the audience know that the Senate will engage in work related to the Strategic Plan and that they look forward to working more closely with our Board of Trustees.

Recognition of faculty and staff
Convocation is a time we recognize new faculty and staff, faculty receiving promotion and tenure, and excellence award recipients. A preview of PSU’s new video, Do Something Great, reflected the attitudes embodied by our students, faculty, staff and alumni.

Starting off 2016-17 Academic Year: Achievements, Goals, and Events

I hope everyone had a great summer achieving goals while also spending time to relax and recharge. We are entering a new academic year which means I will resume my blog on a regular basis.

There were many accomplishments in FY16 through both individual and collective efforts; too many to list here, but they include:

• Adopting a new PSU Strategic Plan
• Finalizing our joint School of Public Health with OHSU and hiring its founding dean.
• Creating five new academic programs and 10 certificates.
• Completing or making significant progress on 24 reTHINK PSU projects; including advances in advising redesign.
• Working collaboratively through the Interest-Based Bargaining process with our faculty unions, PSUFA and PSU AAUP, to establish collective bargaining agreements.
• Individuals and groups of faculty and staff publishing articles, and receiving grant awards and honors.
• Continuing to improve our campus space with building renovations and expansions.
• Establishing task forces on African-American/Black and Asian/Pacific Islander Student Success.

Highlights from the 2016 Winter Symposium

Faculty, staff and administrators met last week for PSU’s 2016 Winter Symposium. The symposium theme was “What Does It Mean to be Educated in the 21^st Century?” A weighty question, but one that captured the purpose of the symposium and our desire to delve deeper into critical conversations about liberal education, the constant changing nature of higher education, our students, and on what we know about knowledge, disciplines, and teaching.

The daylong, over twenty-year tradition is an opportunity for colleagues to learn, share ideas and formulate actions on relevant academic issues. President Wiewel kicked off the event by punctuating the importance of this question for PSU. He referenced our history, changes in PSU’s recent past, our current environment and a look forward to opportunities. The President cited a number of goals and initiatives that call for addressing the symposium’s focus in PSU’s new Strategic Plan. He carried that commitment throughout the day by his participation at the entire Symposium.

Closing in on the Strategic Planning Finish Line

The University has spent 18 months working on our new strategic plan. A diverse Strategic Planning Development Team, eight Topic Teams, and thousands of individuals have helped develop and shape the plan.

There is still work to do before the plan is presented to our Board of Trustees in December, but much has been accomplished to-date. The Strategic Planning website is rich with material that chronicles the Board’s charge to the University, working reports, opportunities for input and feedback, newsletters, process charts, the project management plan, trends in higher education, and just about everything one would want access to in a strategic campus-wide planning effort.

Last week’s ‘Sliders and Suds’ event was yet another opportunity for faculty and staff to provide input on the latest draft.

Convocation 2015: Awards, Successes, and Highlights

Faculty & Staff Convocation 2015 marked the start of the new academic year. New and returning faculty and staff came together for PSU’s traditional acknowledgment and honoring of their accomplishments and to set the table for the coming year.

Let Us Talk Liberal Education
Gina Greco, professor of French and Presiding Officer of the Faculty Senate, opened the event and invited faculty to a campus conversation about liberal education.

As Gina stated, this is “an opportunity for us, as a campus, to launch a conversation about what it should mean to be a PSU graduate, and how we can best articulate that to our students, our community and ourselves.”

She continued, “I would like us to assess where are we succeeding, and where can we improve in our work to prepare students for success in the workplace, for meaningful participation in their communities, for personal growth, and for the pursuit of lifetime learning.” I encourage all faculty to participate in this important conversation and hope you will stay informed of the progress the Faculty Senate makes.