June Newsletter

June 23, 2006

To the DSU Community:

I just returned from the Board of Regents meeting in Brookings. I have actually been in Brookings four days this week. On Tuesday we presented our DSU “informal” budget requests to the board. On Wednesday, I participated in the USDSU budget presentation in the morning and then attended the SDSU presidential search committee in the afternoon. Thursday the board and board committees met all day and this morning the board held another open meeting. All of these interactions with the board, staff of the board and the other management teams from the SD campuses are important as DSU continues to be an institution that is growing in so many ways.

When we presented our informal budget requests, the focus was on some areas that were mandated by the board, e.g. technology needs, facility and infrastructure needs, and utility issues and then we had some latitude to present issues we felt were important for the board to know. One of our major requests involved asking the board to up our major project request for infrastructure improvements from 3 million dollars to 6 or 7 million dollars. When we first were asked to develop a capital request we thought 3 million would be adequate to upgrade our campus infrastructure. After a thorough evaluation by an outside company this estimate came closer to 6 million and thus we are asking for this change from the board. We also discussed our plans for future programs and the rationale for additional funds for the library (127,000), science lab upgrades ($250,000) and funding for a full grants and contracts office ($166,00). In addition we discussed the possibility of DSU hosting the e-mail system for the whole regental system (Similar to our K-12 data center). This hosting function could possibly provide some cost savings for the state.

During the regular board meeting the only issue specific to DSU was the board’s permission to negotiate a lease for the new tablet computers we will bring on campus. With approximately 350 more tablets being leased this fall, it will bring our total of tablet computers on the campus to approximately 1650. This is no small management issue and our computer support department is doing a great job. Other issues that we are interested in include the plan to bring high bandwidth networking to the state. This is a crucial issue to the state if we are to proceed with our research initiatives and DSU should play a major role in these plans.

I am serving as the sitting president on the SDSU search committee as they look for a new president for the Brooking’s campus. Having been through a search conducted by the Board of Regents I can testify to the diligence and care they put into this process and I am appreciating the experience from the other side. They have a very good pool of candidates and it should facilitate an excellent president and colleague at SDSU.

It has been some time since I have had the opportunity to write about my activities and some of the things happening here at DSU. Earlier this summer I accompanied our DSU Summer Study program on their trip to London, Paris and Scotland. It was a great opportunity to get to know some of our students better. Nancy and Roger Moose led the study tour and they are really remarkable “teachers and guides”. They have led this tour on numerous occasions and their expertise and know-how really made the trip enjoyable.
We were up and out of the hotel early every morning touring castles, museums, cathedrals, theaters and even an occasional pub. It once again reaffirmed how strongly I feel about the positive impact when students gain a study abroad kind of experience.

Last week I was the keynote speaker at a conference on the role of technology in college recruiting sponsored by the James Tower Company. I had the chance to speak about some of the decisions that went into our new web presence and the need to look in new directions. The title of my speech was “When Same Old Just Doesn’t Work Anymore”. As you may know DSU and James Tower won some national awards for the design of our recruitment publications and web site. During the conference we heard about several different uses of technology and also different approaches to recruiting carried out on other campuses. As a part of the conference the company sponsored a dinner cruise on Lake Minnetonka (not the same cruise so widely reported by the Minnesota Vikings I can assure you).

Over the last couple of weeks I have visited with a couple more corporate sponsors for our 125th Anniversary President’s Corporate Scholarship campaign. We are now up to $410 thousand pledged. I have a lot of work ahead to achieve this million dollar goal but we will be hitting the road soon to visit with a few more corporations who have a vested interest in our graduates.

Some other miscellaneous meetings over the last few weeks have included:

A review of our current Champions Scholarship levels with a decision to remain at the current level for the next year. $2150 to students with ACT’s above 27, $1650 to students with 24-27 and $500 for students with 21-23. We made some adjustments to the requirements. Our incoming class will have several more students with higher ACTs so we are feeling that this structure is having a positive impact but it will mean a major commitment to raise more funds for these scholarships.
Several meetings related to DSU’s budget have been held during the past few weeks as we finalized our budget for next year. I wish there was better news, but we will have to hold our 10% cut in Operating Expenditures and we were not able to fund several requests. In addition a $15,000 cut in GAF funding (from our student fees) meant reductions in many on campus activities. Our overall academic credit generated numbers were not as high as we had hoped and so we will need to focus on even more aggressive recruiting activities if we are to be in a better financial situation.
The Lake Area Improvement Corporation is exploring a number of ways to promote more business location and entrepreneurial activities in the community and I have attended a few meetings representing DSU’s very important role in this planning.
We had the grand opening of the Madison Technology Center now named the Royce Heuners Technology Park and the Heartland Building. This is an exciting achievement for the community and we will be looking for many of our future students and alumni to be employed in that building.
Individuals on the staff and I continue to participate in many planning meetings at USDSU. We are planning for the building of a new facility that was funded by the legislature and also the building of a new Graduate Education and Applied Research building in which DSU will have a stake.
Very soon DSU will release our new Residential Life master plan that will help guide us to the development of some new housing opportunities for our students. While no major new construction is planned, we are looking at ways to facilitate the upgrading and expansion of some different options for students. We will release more information in the near future.

This summer is very busy here on campus. At a recent Rotary meeting here in Madison, Donna Fawbush our coordinator of summer conferences revealed that we are expecting some 1200 attendees at various meetings and workshops. When you add in all the athletic campers, attendees at banquets and the major attraction of the Chautauqua event on July 14-18, we can expect over 3000 visitors to DSU this summer. One of the really enjoyable activities for my summer is the chance to welcome and greet many of these visitor, in a formal setting or while they are wandering through the campus.

This weekend DSU is sponsoring the University of South Dakota’s production of Forever Plaid at our Dakota Prairie Playhouse. Sharon and I will be attending tonight (Friday) and hosting a reception for the cast and crew at the Girton House following the production. Other performances are at 8 on Saturday evening and 2 PM on Sunday. This is a wonderful show and I hope many will get a chance to see it.

Hope everyone is enjoying the summer weather and that you will all get a chance to stroll through the beautiful DSU campus some time soon.

P.S. If you see me walking around and it looks like I am talking to myself it is really just my way of staying connected through my voice activated Bluetooth Motorola Q PDA device. How cool!