Author: Sara Ornelas

Due to scheduled maintenance and repairs, Jabara Hall will be without water for the whole day on Friday, Dec. 8.

Students can now register for classes for the summer and fall 2023 semesters. Go to the myClasses tab in myWSU to begin registration.

If you have any holds that prevent your registration, you may not be able to register until those holds are lifted. Find out if you have holds on your account by checking the Student Holds channel on the myClasses.

If you would like additional help or have questions regarding spring registration, make an appointment with your advisor. Go to registration homepage to see what day this week you can begin registering.

Dear Shocker family:

We want to thank you for taking part in the town hall event in February, where we introduced our Student Success and Persistence (SSP) initiative, which focuses on giving our students the tools they need to succeed. If you were unable to attend, we hope you take the opportunity to watch a recording of the event, as this initiative requires that every member of our faculty and staff participate.

A key message shared during the town hall was “Student Success is everyone’s responsibility.” To help illustrate this point, members of the President’s Executive Team shared three strategies they are going to own to advance this ideal.

1. Foster a culture of empowerment, leadership and ownership.
2. Adopt an Equity-first mindset and student-centered approach that leads to increased graduation rates.
3. Provide strategic education on and promotion of financial wellness.

In addition, during the town hall, many of you participated in a workshop, where we shared our thoughts and ideas about how to support students and help them succeed. The following themes were aggregated from the results of those discussions:

• Connection and relationships: It’s critical that we establish connections among students, faculty, staff and mentors to create a welcoming and supportive environment for students to feel like they belong.
• Access to resources: Students need access to resources — such as academic support, mental health resources and financial aid — to succeed.
• Personalization: Instructors who engage with students, take an interest in their success and personalize their experiences can have a positive impact on student success.
• Decrease stigma associated with accessing resources: Students need to be encouraged to seek help from mentors and resources without feeling stigmatized.
• Student engagement: Encouraging students to get involved in research projects, organizations and events can help them feel connected to the university community.
• Faculty and staff engagement: Faculty and staff who care about students and make an effort to connect with them can have a positive impact on student success.
• Clarity: Clear processes and support are necessary for students to navigate their academic experiences, and advisers play a critical role in guiding students through these processes.
• Validation of student experiences: Students need to feel validated in their experiences, and their mental health should be a priority.
• Individuality: Students should be treated as individuals and not just as numbers.

Those themes will be the guideposts to creating programs and resources to ensure our students have what they need to succeed.

We have created a Student Success and Persistence Coalition to help us along this journey. Representatives from across the university have been chosen to drive this initiative.

• Gina Crabtree, interim assistant VP of SSP and Registrar’s Office
• Vince Altum, International Education
• Moriah Beck, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry/Retention Fellows coordinator
• Bobby Berry, College of Applied Studies and First-Generation Coordinating Council
• Brien Bolin, Fairmount College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
• Jason Bosch, College of Engineering
• Zachary Brown, Barton School of Business
• Aaron Coffey, Graduate School
• Shelly Coleman-Martins, Strategic Communications
• Bobby Gandu, Undergraduate Admissions
• Linnea GlenMaye, Academic Affairs
• Teri Hall, Student Affairs
• Aaron Hamilton, OneStop Student Services/First-year Advising
• John Hammond, Department of Mathematics and Statistics
• Wendy Hanes, College of Fine Arts
• Ashlie Jack, Academic Affairs
• Shirley Lefever, Academic Affairs
• Sara Mata, Hispanic Service Institution (HSI) Initiatives
• Voncella McCleary-Jones, College of Health Professions
• Alicia Newell, Student Affairs
• John Perry, Barton School of Business
• Anna Porcaro, Office of Online and Adult Learning
• Chelsea Redger-Marquardt, Honors College
• Kim Sandlin, Office of Student Success
• Steven Skinner, College of Engineering
• Sheelu Surender, Office Financial Aid
• Sarah Taylor, Department of Public Health Sciences
• David Wright, Academic Affairs

As we said during the town hall, Student Success and Persistence is not something that we can tackle alone. This is very much a group project. It requires a commitment from each of us to help each individual student find resources to overcome any obstacles impeding their pathway to a degree. That might be connecting them to tutoring or financial aid, helping them find a paid applied learning opportunity, or simply creating a welcoming environment for them in your classroom or office. Each of us has the power to change a student’s trajectory and empower them to achieve their goals.

Just a few simple ideas that you can implement today:

• Course instructors might make a commitment to routinely use the Student Early Alert System to inform students that you recognize behaviors that may indicate additional academic support is warranted. SEAS is a system that generates an email to students outlining the reasons for faculty concerns, such as not attending classes or poor performance in assignments. This can then prompt faculty to take actions to discuss with students about how to improve classroom performance.
• All of us can engage with students when we see them in class or in the RSC. Check in with them, ask questions about how they are doing.
• For offices that employ students, get to know them as individuals and check in on them regularly.
• If a student comes to you with a problem, really listen. The phrase “tell me more about that” is a good way to get more information so that you can point to resources that help them.
• Make time for students. When we promptly return emails, texts and phone calls from students it sends the message they are important, and we care about their success.

Again, we encourage everyone to engage in this work and welcome any comments or ideas to help move this initiative forward. In the meantime, we urge you to stay updated on new developments, share ideas to improve student persistence, and connect with a student every day!

President Rick Muma
Provost Shirley Lefever

Faculty and staff at Wichita State University are required to complete mandatory training on preventing harassment and discrimination. The deadline has been extended to Friday, April 7.

You can access the training two ways:

• Go to myWSU under the Faculty/Staff tab, scroll down to “Employee Required Training” and click on Preventing Harassment and Discrimination Training. Student employees can access the training on the myFinances tab under “Student Required Training.”
• Open the email with subject line Vector LMS, Higher Education Edition Online Training, which was sent to all faculty/staff email addresses on Thursday, March 23.

If you have not completed the training, it is very important that you do so no later than April 7.

This prevention training, which is led through WSU’s Office of Institutional Equity and Compliance, is not only important in making our campus a welcoming and equitable environment, but it’s also important for Title IX compliance. If you have completed your training, thank you for helping us make real progress in making our campus safe, inclusive and equitable.

University supervisors should follow up with their employees to ensure that they are completing the training by the deadline. Supervisors are expected to work with employees needing accommodations or extensions as necessary.

NVIDIA, NetApp and Mark III Systems are hosting a free AI/Machine Learning Education Series for Wichita State students, faculty, staff and the greater community for spring 2023.

These sessions will feature machine-learning (ML) experts, who will dive into current trends around AI/ML via tutorials and hands-on rapid labs designed around practical AI education. This series is virtual and will be delivered remotely via Jupyter Notebooks.

• Intro to Machine Learning and AI: The Basics, A Tutorial, and Lab — 11 a.m. to noon Wednesday, March 8.
• Introduction to Deep Learning and Neural Networks — 11 a.m. to noon Wednesday, March 22.
• Introduction to Datasets — 11 a.m. to noon Wednesday, April 5
• Introduction to Computer Vision — 11 a.m. to noon Wednesday, April 19
• Getting Started with Containers and AI — 11 a.m. to noon Wednesday, May 3

President Rick Muma and Provost Shirley Lefever hosted a town hall event on Tuesday, Feb. 7 to discuss Wichita State’s new Student Success and Persistence (SSP) initiative. The initiative is the next iteration of Wichita State’s implementation of recommendations from the National Institute for Student Success (NISS) in the report commissioned by the Kansas Board of Regents. 

The overall goal of Wichita State is to narrow the equity gap between the university’s underserved and non-underserved student populations. 

During the town hall, Lefever identified three strategies that faculty and staff are expected to embrace as part of the university’s efforts to foster student achievement and promote success.

• Foster a culture of empowerment, leadership and ownership.   
• Take an equity-first mindset and student-centered approach that will lead to increased graduation rates.   
• Increase strategic education and promotion of financial wellness. 

After remarks from Muma and Lefever, participants gathered in small groups to share feedback about the SSP initiative, the university’s culture regarding students, suggestions and experiences with student success.

Wichita State University is committed to providing the best education and resources for our students, but we know that student persistence is an ongoing challenge for many institutions.

That’s why we’ve developed goals and an action plan to support our students and foster their success. The Student Success and Persistence (SSP) initiative, which falls under the umbrella of Strategic Enrollment Management, includes comprehensive and holistic tactics to support our students throughout their academic journeys.

To learn more about SSP, watch the above 90-second video and attend a town hall event at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Feb. 7 in the Rhatigan Student Center ballroom.

It’s a new year and a new semester at Wichita State University, and our campus is alive with innovation, opportunities and Shocker spirit.

Wichita State University’s efforts to improve vaccine equity are reaching throughout Kansas with the Increase the Reach grant program.

In recent months, the community engagement phase of the Vaccine Equity for Guatemalan Indigenous Communities project took Wichita State representatives to places such as Coffeyville, Arkansas City and Dodge City. They represent Alce Su Voz (Spanish for “speak out”), a coalition of Spanish-speaking Latinx families, interpreters, health care providers, community leaders and university faculty and students whose mission is to improve health equity for Spanish speakers and speakers of indigenous languages in Kansas.

“This is critically important due to the changing demographics of our state,” said Monique Garcia, community initiatives manager for the Public Policy and Management at WSU. “We have a lot of opportunity to engage with these communities and recognize the existence of barriers and be proactive to remove barriers so these folks are able to access quality health care.”

Wichita State University has appointed Brandy Willett as regional director of the Kansas Small Business Development Center (SBDC), following the retirement of Marcia Stevens.

Stevens led the SBDC at WSU for more than 20 years and leaves a legacy of a solid and thriving program.

As the new regional director, Willett is dedicated to individualized service of small Kansas businesses and plans to grow SBDC’s influence and partnerships in the region. A graduate of Wichita State’s Elliott School of Communication, Willett has championed Kansas small businesses since her arrival to Wichita in 2016.

Her experience spans the breadth of small business challenges and success. Willett is committed to promoting Wichita’s entrepreneurial spirit and volunteers with many related organizations – including 1 Million Cups, a weekly forum showcasing local startups, and Designation Innovation, a youth empowerment nonprofit that includes youth entrepreneurship as one of its central concepts.

“We are deeply grateful to Marcia Stevens for her decades of dedicated service to Wichita State University via the Kansas Small Business Development Center,” said Shirley Lefever, WSU provost and executive vice president. “We are confident that under Brandy Willett’s leadership, the SBDC will continue to thrive.”

WSU also welcomes Rebecca Ignowski, business advisor at the SBDC, and greatly appreciates the continued contributions of Assistant Director Frank Choriego, 10 years with Kansas SBDC, and Karen Loyd, administrative specialist of 22 years.