2023 State of the University Address [Howard Reddy:] Thank you all for taking the time to join us here this morning. The State of the University is a special tradition at the University of West Florida where you will hear from some of our leaders. And to begin, I would like to recognize members of our Board of Trustees who are here this morning, Trustee Dick Baker, Dr. Susan James, and Ariana Range. Thank you for being here. I would also like to recognize members of our foundation board who are here, our Chair, James Homan and Vice Chair Bruce Friedenburg. Thank you for being here. And I should also recognize Kiana Montoya as SGA VP who is also a member of the Foundation Board. Thank you, Kiana. Our first speaker this morning is Dr. Susan James. Dr. Susan James is an associate professor in UWF’s School of Education and director of the Emerald Coast Writing Project. She also serves as UWF’s Faculty Senate President, please welcome Dr. Susan James. [Dr. Susan James:] Good morning, it’s my privilege to be here. I’m very glad to represent the faculty here, and I would venture to guess that I have probably one of the longest running relationships with this University. My father was brought to Pensacola in 1976 as a Supply Corps officer on the Lexington. And my mother helped many of the wives that were her, continue their education and get registered here at UWF. So then when I was in 1990, I came back to Pensacola, I was a widow of a marine pilot and Dr. Phila Crane helped me through that and I became certified here in Florida to teach. Then after Hurricane Katrina, I came back to UWF again. My home was destroyed and I was a new mother to an adopted child. Again, I was shepherded into the University by the professors here. I earned a Master's Degree, and it was those professors that convinced me that I needed to go off to Florida State because hey said, “you have to go away to come home again,” and I wanted to be here back home. When I think of these experiences, I am reminded about UWF and what had transpired over the many decades that I’ve had this relationship with UWF, and you know, we’ve always held firm our core values. And we have always looked at things and done things, but have always made them better and stronger. And that was very indicative of the experience that I had as a military spouse. This change has continued to go on, and this is indicative of how we do things at UWF. You know, we shepherd in many of the military people, but now we’re a gold level school. We use our core values, we work together, and I have a dream team this year with the faculty senate, I do call them the dream team. We’ve got one professor that’s working on finding a marker for Alzheimer’s. Pretty good, huh? We have one that’s working in a simulation lab with nursing students. We have one that is a communication expert. She keeps all the executive committee in line, which is good. We have an award-winning history professor. And the last of those slackers, I say jokingly, created his own system for analyzing political people, our nation’s leaders and their management and leadership styles. So I’m sure he’s keeping very busy at this point. Matt Crow is my Vice President, he’s in criminal justice. Jacob Shively is the governance committee chair. Heather Riddell is my academic council chair. I see Jill Van Der Like here today, she’s my secretary. Jim Arruda of psychology is working in planning and special issues. And Jamin Wells is our UFF representative. We are all looking very forward to working with Dr. Saunders and Dr. Leg and the board of trustees. We want to continue to help navigate the ever-changing landscape that we have, partner for improvement, and really highlight the excellence we have in our programs. This year, we’re really going to be focusing on the change with the School of Education. There’s going to be a realignment with the college University standing committees. We’re going to be rewriting a lot of bylaws, working on that. We’re going to maintain our partnership with SGA and with the senate, steps in it and make sure that we are working on those food insecurities in the Argo Pantry. As always, we will continue to take those great ideas, make them stronger, make them better. And I’m going to leave you with one last story, and it’s my best story for last here. I now am a parent of a child that is a student here at UWF. And I look at now our university through her eyes. She spent the first 10 months in an orphanage in Russia and she talks about, and this is her word, “I have very passionate professors”, and she told me, she said, “you know, I really feel like they”, these are her words, “they feed my intellectual soul”. And to me, there's nothing better than that. She sees this as a safe haven that feeds her intellectual soul. And it is a true testament to our faculty and what we do to provide for our community with our research, teaching, and service. And I'm very proud to be a representative for our faculty. Thank you, and I look forward to working with all of you. [Howard Reddy:] Thank you, Dr. James. Our next speaker is Ethan Henley, who is the Director of Undergraduate Admissions and serves as Staff Senate President. Please welcome Ethan. [Ethan Henley:] All right. Good morning, colleagues, friends in the entire Argonaut community. My name is Ethan Henley and I have the distinct honor of serving as Staff Senate President. I first want to extend our appreciation to President Saunders and her cabinet for their steadfast leadership and support. As we navigated challenges and experienced triumph over the past year. In true argonaut fashion, we all understand the need to work together and we look forward to continuing our mission this upcoming year. Staff Senate is a team of two dozen senators representing more than 800 staff members across all UWF campuses. At our core, we endeavor to improve the quality of our workplace and promote a productive work environment. Staff Senate serves as a two-way communication channel between University administration and UWF staff members. Senators are charged with relaying important and timely information to their staff constituents, while also serving as resources to address staff issues and concerns. As advocates, we encourage staff members to engage with Staff Senate and to let your voices be heard. Staff Senate has the privilege of coordinating various initiatives to support and recognize staff, while also engaging in community service. Notable events include Holiday Fest, being held in early December with signature downtown festivities scheduled for December 6th, and the employee recognition and awards program or “ERAP”, as many of you have referred to it as, which is gonna be held on April 4th, 2024. Last year, nearly 40 staff members were recognized through the ERAP program, and we encourage you to nominate your outstanding colleagues for recognition at next year's ERAP ceremony with applications opening later this year. Staff members also have access to support resources through our employee textbook scholarship program, and the Employee Emergency Fund. Please visit the Staff Senate website or contact your senator for more information about these available resources. This year, Staff Senate will continue community service efforts through our Hand to Paw initiative, benefiting local humane organizations. Last year, the Emerald Coast campus collected 475 pounds of supplies benefiting the Panhandle Animal Welfare Society. Additionally, and by popular demands, we plan to host these second annual Argo Pantry Food Fight in collaboration with Faculty Senate and SGA during Founder's Week. All donations will go to support the Argo Pantry and support its mission to fight food insecurity among our students. And in closing, much like Jason and the Argonauts, never tired in their quest for the golden fleece, neither do UWF staff members as we support our students and our campus community. On behalf of Staff Senate, thank you for all that you do in support of this great university. Thank you. [Howard Reddy:] Thank you, Ethan. Joining us now is Auriana Range, who serves as president of the Student Government Association. Auriana is a legal studies and political science pre-law major. In addition to SGA, Auriana is in the Kugelman Honors Program, a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, the Campus Activity Board, and the African-American Student Association. Please welcome Auriana. [Auriana Range:] Good morning. I'm so honored to serve as the 2023 Student Body President and Board of Trustee Member. As VP Ready said, I'm a third year legal studies and political science major, and I've been involved with SGA since my freshman year. I've seen some amazing accomplishments from this amazing program on this amazing campus. The previous SGA administration completed numerous initiatives by focusing on funding opportunities for students to support their social and working lives. These projects included the completion of the Argo Den, a library space on campus where students may receive free school supplies and materials, voting to increase the minimum wage on campus, and supporting facility needs for departments, such as our childcare center, the ERCCD. There were also numerous events for students to participate in, including Cards and Cookies, an event where students wrote encouraging messages to those affected by breast cancer, the annual SGA picnic and the celebration of different cultures through different center resolutions. The current administration led by Vice President Kiana Montoya and I ran on the platform of hope. We want to improve the health of students, expand opportunities, increase pride, and create new experiences. Now, to break it down a little bit about how we're gonna do that, H stands for health. We hope to improve the mental, sexual and physical help of students through partnerships with the Rec and peer educators, a student group on campus that focuses on the wellness of students. We have started to build peer build partnerships with peer educators, the HLS and the Rec and hope to support their events in the future. Additionally, the Budget and Allocation Chair, Dylan Pogreba and I allocated $25,000 to the HLS for them to purchase new equipment, including new treadmills for students, which I had not been to the gym recently, but I will be there eventually. Next, O stands for opportunities. are working to increase opportunities for students to get involved with Student Government Association and the local Northwest Florida community. We have improved student accessibility to their SGA by creating open office hours for students to come and talk about their issues and participated in more University sponsored tabling events for students to meet with us. We are also working on creating an SGA alumni network to connect and provide advice to students. Hopefully we can have an annual dinner where alumni come back and we just celebrate SGA. So for all those previous S G A members in the house, please call me up. P stands for pride. We hope to increase the pride in students and pride in being an Argo by preaching different cultures and collaborating with identity-based organizations. We recently hosted the Student Support Fair, which gathered identity based campus organizations such as African American Student Association, UWF NPHC, Spoonies, so many other campus organizations and departments on campus, such as first year advising, undergraduate admissions, financial aid, so very grateful to all those in the room who came out and supported us to show what resources are available to help students to feel at home at UWF. In the next two weeks, we are planning to have our fall Diversity Week, our First Annual Diversity Week, hosted by our Director of Diversity Initiatives, AC Hicks, on October 9th through 13th, where it focuses on celebrating indigenous people, coming out day, Hispanic Heritage Month, and a clothes drive to donate to a local homeless shelter. And then finally, E stands for experience. We hope by accomplishing the objectives in H.O.P, we will improve the student experience. This objective also includes creating new experiences of tradition. Our newest upcoming tradition is the Argo Rally, a nighttime pep rally and kind of block party vibe before the homecoming game to celebrate student athletes and the Argo community. The first rally will be held next Friday, October 6th, outside the field house from six to eight p.m. So if you do have some time to stop by, please do. We're gonna have a lot of good food, tie dye, and a lot of people out there. And additionally, with experience, we are working with athletics, so shout out to athletics for letting me and Kiana be honorary captains and flip the coin. I’m the best coin tosser if you didn't know, it was really fun. So we were really grateful. So throughout this year, the arrangement, Range-Montoya administration has been highly successful in the execution of our platform, and it's only September, so we’ve still got a lot of work to do, and we've been working with local campus and community partners in events such as our voter education drive, where we registered over 20 students and checked over 50 students’ voter registration statuses, and speaking at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University's SGA inauguration. We are extremely excited about this school year and our upcoming plans, and we really want to thank and send a lot of gratitude to the University faculty, staff, and leadership who are helping us to reach our goals and who keep setting up meetings with us and who keep supporting us. So, super excited to see where it goes. Thank you guys so much, and as always, go Argos. [Howard Reddy:] Thank you, Auriana. We're gonna now enjoy a performance from the U W F Jazz combo. Please welcome Dr. Joe Spinola and the UWF Jazz combo. Thank you Dr. Spinola and the UWF Jazz combo. It is now my pleasure to introduce our President. Dr. Saunders has been our president since 2017, and under her leadership, UWF continues to flourish as one of Florida's top universities. Her vision for UWF to grow as a leader in innovation and cutting edge academic programs will take us to new heights and propel our University into the future. Please welcome your president, Dr. Martha Saunders. [Dr. Martha Saunders:] Hey good morning, and welcome to the State of the University address. I'll just cut to the chase, your University is doing just fine, have a good day. The good ship Argo is sailing full speed, and we have a lot to show for our efforts this year in the form of national recognitions, student achievements, and increased support. I believe we have been successful because we have kept our focus on our mission. Now, in case you don't have it memorized, the mission of the institution, UWF delivers a learner focused University education that enables students from varied backgrounds to meet their career and life goals. UWF research and community partnerships advance the body of knowledge and enhance the prosperity of the region and the state. Now you'll see some highlighted places on the mission statement because I think they matter. One is that we are learner focused. And when you think about it, we're all learners. We're in the education business, but we meet our students where they are and it makes a difference in the outcome. We know a University education is not like any other. It is broad, hence the name University, lots of different pieces, parts to it. And it merges all of these various elements to create an educational experience. Our students come from varied backgrounds, all over the world, all over the country, all different kinds of people, all different kinds of backgrounds and I think that adds and enhances the culture of the institution. We've been very successful in helping our students meet their career and life goals, and that has shown, you'll hear more about it a little later in performance-based funding metrics. Our students are wanted by employers, and I think that's a quality metric. We serve the body of knowledge, and I think sometimes it's important to keep that in mind. If someone says, what's your industry? The answer is knowledge, That's my industry. We create it in our labs, we disseminate it in our classrooms, we apply it through our service in the communities, and we preserve it in our libraries. And in doing all of that, our region and our state is well served and prosperity is increased. Theodore Roosevelt said, far and away, the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing. The work that we do here at the University of West Florida is work worth doing. Our efforts follow the University strategic plan. This was approved for 2022 through 2027, and it includes seven strategic directions that guide our decision making. And I have a few highlights to share with you as to how we did this year. Strategic Direction One is student centered and focused, and do we ever have students this year? And lots of them. Enrollment is up overall by 6% and 14.2% over three years. Many thanks to Katie Condon and her energetic team of recruiters for corralling these wonderful students and bringing more to us. We've been recognized as a goal level University in the large public school category in the Annual Military Friendly Schools List for 23/24. UWF earned the Gold Distinction for success in helping veterans make the transition from the military to school and ultimately rewarding civilian careers. This marks the fifth year UWF has received a designation for military friendly and many thanks to Lori Milkeris and her team for helping to make that happen again. Again this year, US News and World Report has recognized us as a Top 10 Public Regional University with special recognition as a best college for veterans and for undergraduate nursing. Our athletic programs brought in more conference championships, bringing the total to 117 and still going, and we are building champions for life. Thank you Dave Scott and your energetic team for helping make all that happen. Dean David Bellar and Associate Vice President Matt Schwartz aren't here today because they successfully negotiated a $6.7 million triumph proposal and they're at the Triumph meeting, working out the final details of that. That proposal will add more than 4,600 square feet of new and renovated nursing simulation facilities. This new funding will enhance nursing program offerings on both the Pensacola and Emerald Coast campuses, allowing UWF to make important new contributions to the state and regional healthcare workforce. Also from the Usha Kundu MD College of Health, we have an entry into practice Master of Science in nursing. This new five semester in-person graduate program is being offered on UWF Pensacola campus and Emerald Coast location, and is a direct pathway to the nursing profession for those who already have a non-nursing degree. And many thanks to Melinda Bowers, the dean of the Emerald Coast campus for her assistance in making all of that happen. Dean Rick Fountain is probably just proud as punch of some of the activities that they have going on in the College of Business. One particular is the student managed Argo Bond Fund, which won first place among the nation's student managed bond funds at the Quinnipiac University Global Asset Management Education Annual Conference. Under the leadership and the advice of professor K.C. Ma, the $1 million Argo Bond Fund continues to outperform their benchmark. They're at 4.2% versus 0.8%. Now that's a slam dunk, and that's real money. Dr. Ma and his students also manage a $500,000 fund that is invested in equities and they're delivering a solid performance. We earn top scores in several performance-based funding metric categories. Now this is everybody's win, but I wanted to give a special shout out to the man who tracks the data for us. Christophe Lizen, thank you so much. Strategic Direction two, employee success. UWF was named a 2023 Great college to work for the 11th year with special designation as an honor roll institution for the fifth straight year. UWF Earned Honor roll in nine recognition categories. Only two universities in Florida won that recognition. We have new leadership in significant areas. Gary Liguori joined us in January as Provost and Senior Vice President. Now I read something recently about that position and it said, being a provost is easy. It's like riding a bike, except the bike is on fire. You're on fire and everything is on fire. Is that true? Okay, though so. Caleb Nobles and alum has joined us as head football coach. Chris Martin, US Navy retired and former skipper at the Naval Air Station has the folks and facilities marching smartly. Another alum Communication major Abigail Megginson is currently shadowing Rachel Witbracht and will be taking over as director of government relations in time for the legislature to convene in January. Now, as we think about employee success, I have a little assignment for you. It's from Marcus Aurelius, and he said, when you need encouragement, think of the qualities of the people around you. This one's energy, that one's modesty, another's generosity and so on. Nothing is as encouraging as when virtues are visibly embodied in the people around us and when we're practically showered with them. So it's good to keep this in mind. So before you leave campus today, please share your appreciation to one coworker for an attribute you admire. And I'm gonna start with three. Auriana, I admire your energy. Ethan, I admire your communication skills. Susan, I admire your big, kind, generous heart. Thank you for what you do. See how easy that was. Strategic Direction Three, exceptional academic programming and scholarship aligned with state needs. We have a new Office of Workforce Development under the leadership of Sherry Hartnett. Here we are building on the success in PBF metrics one and two, and she will be collaborating with our Office of Career Development and Community Engagement to expand employment pipelines with major employers in the region. Faculty research matters not just to the body of knowledge, but to ordinary people who live in our part of the world. Professors Raid Amin and Rodney Guttmann working with graduate students have made observations helpful to health agencies in identifying conditions that may be driving unusually high rates of suicide and/or opioid deaths. The same model is being used to identify maternal mortality, teenage birth rates, bavaria clusters of breast cancer and lung cancer and domestic violence clusters. Professor Hakki Sevil and a graduate student have developed a framework for 3-D modeling using a team of small drones. Their research aims to assist response teams in emergency situations such as wildfires, disaster relief efforts, and search and rescue missions. Professor Jim Arruda has developed a new approach for the early detection of Alzheimer's disease. To all of our faculty scholar researchers,I offer my thanks and my appreciation, not just for me and not just for the university, but this region and this state. Thank you so much. You do important work. Strategic Direction Four, community and economic engagement. The small but mighty development team in Howard Reddy's Advancement Division continue to do better and better with record fundraising across the dashboard. Most alumni participation in school history, most faculty staff giving in school history, most taken in on the annual day of giving and a whole lot of other stuff too that Howard would be happy to tell you about. And he would also take your check. Our students stayed on their feet for hours to raise more than $30,000 at the annual Dance Marathon for the Children's Miracle Network. We opened a makerspace in downtown Pensacola to support creative entrepreneurs and artistic activities. Many hands went into this project, but Thomas Asmuth spearheaded the effort and we are very grateful for that. Strategic Direction Five, infrastructure. The legislative session was one of the best years ever for UWF. A $21.5 million increase in operational enhancements will be invested as follows, faculty hiring and programs of strategic emphasis, enhancing academic and financial advising, student success initiatives, affordability and faculty and staff retention. The 23/24 state capital appropriations included funding for the UWF Science and Engineering Research Wing, and for UWF'S satellite utilities plant. Many thanks to our local delegation, particularly Senator Broxson for their efforts on our behalf. Now also note this was one of the busiest legislative sessions for higher education in the state's history.There were a total of 28 bills, either completely involving higher ed or touching on parts of higher ed through different topics. Many of these require changes and statutorily required reports To comply with some of them, we have been on tight deadlines. Much remains to be done, we will do our best to get it right. Strategic direction six, operational excellence. The new Office of Emergency Management, which reports to the university police, exists to increase the university's capabilities to respond to the hazards that threaten the campus, all the while preventing or reducing the impact of the hazards on the community. Doug Hirsch is leading that effort. A reorganization in the Division of Academic Affairs created a standalone school of education reporting directly to the provost. Our university police earned accreditation from the Commission for Florida Law Enforcement Accreditation. Congratulations, Chief Cossich, that was quite an achievement. Strategic direction seven, I think I've got 'em all up now, a culture of inclusion and civility. This is a new strategic direction and one that we are giving more than lip service. Now, more than ever, people need to address difficult issues with good intentions. Look for events planned by our newly formed Office of Public Policy, beginning with a debate on the electoral college Wednesday, October 11th, and it should be good. Now, I probably shouldn't have to say this, but I will. All good things require resources, human and otherwise, and I think it's always good to remind you of where our resources come from. Money really doesn't grow on trees. And if you take a look at this, you will see there are two primary sources for our funding. One, is tuition. Our students pay us to help provide their education, and the other is from the state. So if you think we may be spending an over amount of time on recruitment, or lobbying, you're wrong. It's important and this is important funding. And look at all the good it does. So looking back on the past year, I hope you are as proud as I am of our accomplishments. Now, looking ahead, “If we want things to stay as they are, things we'll have to change”. Now, this quote is from the novel, the Leopard by Tomasi di Lampedusa. And it's widely quoted, widely interpreted, but for our purposes, I think it means we can't stand still. If we do exactly this year, what we did last year, the result will not be as positive. Change is forward looking, change is dynamic. Uh, our energetic board chair, Suzanne Lewis often advises us that if we want something new to happen, we can either do things differently or do different things. Either way, we're moving. So where do we go from here? A friend of mine took up snow skiing late, late in life later than most people. And she wrote about her experience. And she said, in skiing and in life, where you rest your gaze is where you will go. If you look at the fallen snowboarder, you will hit the fallen snowboarder. If you glance repeatedly to the left, the right, and behind you will most certainly go round and round and then down. As with one's drishti in yoga practice, the eyes control the body. For the past few years at UWF, we have set our gaze on access, programs of excellence, and workforce alignment. We will continue on that path. Expect to see movement in facilities. We have begun, the Sansing, Sports Medicine Center is underway. A new campus gateway is about to get started and it will help people know when they get here, they have arrived at the University of West Florida. We're involved in stadium planning and have consultants working with us on the best approach to that project. The building for Annex is in planning, and we are continuing with much needed repairs. We're going to begin planning for a new residence hall to house our growing, living learning communities. Other projects, it is time to find the right mix of support for faculty research, and we will be working on that. Campus life enhancements will include more emphasis on walkability and pedestrian safety. And a new capital campaign launching in the spring will bring much needed assistance in the form of scholarships. So refreshments are waiting. I hope you will greet the people they have that I have called out today. They want to tell you about their work, and they're wearing very special name tags and you can find them. At their September meeting, Our board of trustees voted to extend my contract. Pending approval from the Board of Governors, I'm going to be here a little while longer. It's an honor to be your president, now let's get back to work. Thank you.