IN THE SPIRIT OF COMPASSION
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Team,
As we near the end of the semester and the start of the holiday season, I have been reflecting on all that has been accomplished since August, and how proud I continue to be of our Bengal family. When I spoke with you at the start of the semester, I shared what a tremendous amount of heart I have seen at this University. I continue to believe this is truly one of our greatest strengths. Our dedicated faculty and staff show their pride and commitment each day as they inspire a passion for learning and serve our students. I am grateful for all of you.
Let us remember that our campus community achieves all of this while also managing other aspects of their lives
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the needs of our families and friends, communities, and self. To be successful requires that we have and show a tremendous amount of compassion for one another. Our campus community is only as successful as our human connections.
We demonstrate this compassion by supporting a colleague as they push a big project across the finish line or deal with a difficult health issue. We support our students as they manage their class loads, demands of their outside work, financial pressures, mental health, and family needs. We support our guests at all campus locations by taking the time to offer a smile and hello, or walking a visitor to their destination. Acts of compassion are often small, but the rewards experienced by those receiving it are immense. Help us be the campus that exemplifies compassion, help instill it in our students, who will then carry this with them as they leave us to change the world.
In this spirit of compassion, I would like to again express my gratitude for all of you. With students out of class this week,
I am happy to provide a half-day of release time on Wednesday, November 27, 2019, in advance of the Thanksgiving Holiday.
Please take this as an opportunity to spend a little extra time with family and friends.
Although some departments will remain open due to business necessity, the majority of administrative offices and classroom buildings will close at noon on November 27. If you are a staff member that had already planned on being out of the office that day, you will only need to use four hours of vacation time. Staff working a full day on the 27th due to departmental business needs will be granted four hours of compensatory time to be used at a later date. If you have questions, please reach out to your department director or contact Human Resources at (208) 282-2517.
Initiatives updates:
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For the first time in our 118-year history, we are changing the way we celebrate our graduates by adding a
winter commencement ceremony
. Last spring’s commencement was the largest in Idaho State’s history. Winter commencement will ensure the ceremony can remain under two hours and so students have an opportunity to graduate as they complete their degrees. I encourage faculty and staff to make an effort to attend the winter commencement ceremony on Saturday, December 14, to recognize and celebrate our graduates.
Governor Little recently asked all state agencies to reduce their budgets by 1% this fiscal year and an additional 1% in FY2021 given projected downfalls in State revenues. These reductions are intended to reset state spending and are not in response to a state budget shortfall. For ISU, this means an approximate $850,000 reduction in our appropriated budget this fiscal year, and another $850,000 reduction next year. Our leadership team will be working together in a spirit of collaboration to meet this State of Idaho request. I know there are many questions about how this will impact our University. We do not have all of the answers right now, but campus will be involved and updated as soon as a plan is identified.
We have started the process to create a
visionary 10-year strategic plan
for our University to be adopted by 2021. More information about the process is available
online
, but it will be inclusive, transparent, and support higher education best practices. An open forum is scheduled on Tuesday, December 10, to present the proposed strategic planning process with campus.
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Here’s a short list of recent highlights and accomplishments:
- The DNA Doe Project, with help from Idaho State University anthropologist Samantha Blatt and former ISU faculty Amy Michael, has made a tentative positive identification of Clark County, Idaho/Buffalo Cave John Doe, whose remains were originally found in 1979.
- ISU communication professor emerita Martine Beachboard was awarded a Fulbright Grant to Kosovo to help enhance women’s rights.
- College of Business professor and interim associate dean Bob Houghton was awarded a Fulbright Specialist Appointment to teach and review curriculum on cybersecurity at Tashkent University of Information Technology in Uzbekistan.
- ISU associate professor Ken Aho participated in a National Science Foundation grant to study organisms floating in the air, some of which help form rain and ice.
- David Kleist, chair and professor in the Department of Counseling, recently received the 2019 Association for Counselor Education and Supervision Legacy Award.
- Nuclear engineering associate professor Mary Lou Dunzik-Gougar is the principal investigator on a $800,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy Nuclear Energy University Program to study incredibly tiny materials to determine their strength to support development of new nuclear fuels.
- In time for the holidays, a third Benny’s Pantry location opened in Meridian last week. The original Benny’s Pantry opened at Pocatello in January 2014 and then opened in Idaho Falls in October 2015. Benny’s Pantry is an initiative within Student Affairs to provide food for Bengals in need.
- On November 7, ISU was honored by Idaho Congressman Mike Simpson, who recognized the entry of the College of Technology’s Construction Combine program into the Congressional Record. The combine is a unique program developed by the COT’s Continuing Education and Workforce Training Division that partnered with Home Depot to address a national skilled labor shortage in the construction industry.
It’s been a great semester for Idaho State, and together, we are changing the lives of our students.
Roar, Bengals, Roar!
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Kevin
Kevin Satterlee
President
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