Office of the President
Monday Morning Memo | September 22, 2008
Good morning! We have had an exciting few days with our Aggie teams: Women's volleyball defeated Fresno State and Nevada in three sets each. Our football team obtained a great victory against UTEP; the first time since 1994 that NMSU has won at UTEP and the second consecutive year to win the Battle of I-10. I hope you join us for the next football game on Saturday afternoon as we host UNM, and be sure to wear your Crimson and White as we create a sea of crimson in Aggie Memorial Stadium. The same day, our volleyball team takes on Hawaii.
I also want to encourage our campus community as well as the general public to attend a panel forum titled "The Financial Crisis: What It Means to You" at 2:30 p.m. Wednesday, September 24, in Guthrie Hall Room 100 at NMSU-Las Cruces. The goal of the event is to provide answers to questions about the current state of the troubled U.S. financial sector and how those conditions directly affect people on a daily basis. Please join us for this important discussion.
Just as we reach out to the community, we place a high priority on meeting our students' needs and the Division of Student Success (DSS) takes the lead in this regard at NMSU. DSS serves students before, during, and beyond their NMSU experience. DSS works system-wide with students by helping them obtain financial aid to support their attendance and by maintaining permanent academic records. For students on the Las Cruces campus, DSS provides health and wellness services, campus activities, ethnic programs, career services, and academic support. DSS sponsors events year-round, such as the recent two-day Career Fair and next month's Aggie Experience, a visitation day typically attended by hundreds of regional high school seniors. Here is a brief update about DSS:
Enrollment - On the census date, NMSU's system-wide student enrollment for 2008-2009 was up 8.8 percent over last year; total enrollment for all campuses was over 31,300 students. It's particularly encouraging that transfer students are up 12 percent, as this reflects work over the past year on generating equivalency guides for independent community colleges in the region. To assist students in pursuing their academic goals, financial aid disbursements system-wide are over $56 million for the semester.
Graduate and International Student Services - Following this summer's reorganization of Enrollment Management, an audit of Graduate and International Student Services was conducted to evaluate processes and to develop procedures consistent for all types of students. The reorganization and audit will allow NMSU to coordinate services in a way that better meets the needs of all students.
Wellness Initiative - On September 12, faculty, staff, and students began coordinating NMSU's new Wellness Initiative. NMSU has many of the fundamental elements of an excellent wellness program in place; joining them into a coordinated whole will be one of the tasks of this group. By the end of September, the Wellness Committee will have assessed wellness programs at peer institutions. The overall goal is to have NMSU's initiative sketched out by the end of January.
Student Success Center - Consistent with a national trend in which academic support services are opening in academic and housing facilities, Student Success Center-Zuhl, a collaboration between the Division of Student Success and the NMSU Libraries, opened at the start of the fall semester. The Center offers free tutoring, in addition to the tutoring site in La Vista Learning Center in Garcia Residence Hall, and cross-campus advising. Students seeking to explore or change majors can get information on careers, help with administrative processes associated with changing majors, and contacts in their new academic home.
Planning for the Division - The Plan of Action for the Division of Student Services is posted on the web at http://success.nmsu.edu/plan/index.html. Developing this plan involved examining extensive input from outside surveys, consultants, experts in higher education, including Foundations of Excellence and Noel Levitz surveys. The final plan details priorities in enrollment management and academic, wellness, and social support for students.
We are proud of Vice President Carmen Gonzales and her wonderful DSS team for inspiring us to keep student success at the heart of everything we do at NMSU.
Have a great week and Go Aggies!
Waded Cruzado
