June/July/August News Releases (2001)

ORIENTATION (Cont.)

Students can start moving into the residence halls at 10 a.m. Wednesday. They’ll get help from the “Dragon Move-In Crew,” about 50 Student Orientation Counselors along with more than 50 other MSUM employees (including President Roland Barden and his vice presidents, administrators, faculty and staff) who’ve volunteered to help. The crew will help students move into their new rooms from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday.

New MSUM students will also be among 100,000 college students throughout the country who will join in the Making College Count Orientation program, an interactive presentation designed to help make the transition to campus life. It will be held from 4 to 5 p.m. Wednesday in Weld Hall’s Glasrud Auditorium.

The program, provided at no cost to colleges and university, is made possible through corporate partnerships. It covers transitional issues ranging from time management and study skills to goal setting and how to maximize opportunities after graduating.

Orientation check-in runs from 2 to 6 p.m. A dinner will be held for students and their families in Kise Commons from 5 to 7 p.m. Then students will meet Student Orientation Counselors and other students in a get-together from 8 to 9 p.m. on Murray Beach.

On Thursday, the University Welcome Convocation runs from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. in the Roland Dille Center for the Arts Hansen Theatre. It’s the first meeting for the incoming class of 2001 aimed at introducing new students

MnSCU Chancellor James H. McCormick will be on campus Thursday morning to visit with faculty, students, and staff. He will also participate in the University Welcome Convocation, which will be followed by short presentations on critical information new students need to know, including residence hall introductions, off-campus and non-traditional student meetings, a barbecue at 5 p.m. at Murray Beach, followed by a dance from 7 to 10 p.m. at Murray Beach, featuring “Music in Motion.”

Friday’s sessions include loan counseling, library orientations, games, skits, break-out sessions on dating, going on-line, personal safety, freshmen basics, and self defense. A transfer student session will also be held from 2 to 3 p.m. From 7 to 9 p.m. in the Roland Dille Center for the Arts Hansen Theatre, it’s the 21st annual Campus Capers, a series of skits and words of wisdom from the student orientation staff.

Another dance that night in the MSUM’s Underground Non-Alcoholic Night Club runs from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. in Comstock Memorial Union Ballroom.

Saturday there’s a bus tour of the city at 2 p.m., more break-out sessions, music, and other games at Murray Beach from 2 to 4:30. A Christian rock group called “Shattered” performs on Murray Beach from 4:30 to 6 p.m., followed by a dance and Karaoke contest in the Underground from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m.

Classes begin Monday, August 27.

Bakke, also MSUM’s G.I. Bill coordinator, is a member of the VA’s Education Business Process Reengineering committee that’s reviewing how students and schools process GI Bill educational benefits. The VA wants to move most of that process from a paper to on-line.

Bakke recently demonstrated MSUM’s interactive Web site for veterans (www.msum.edu/veterans) while attending a two-day meeting for the VA Education Business Process Reengineering committee. They were so impressed with the way it worked, the VA named him to the web portal advisory committee.

Once completed, the VA’s interactive web portal will allow veterans to use it to access a variety of data ranging from eligibility and benefits to certification and payments.

$160,000 NSF GRANT
UPGRADES MSUM’S
BIOTECH PROGRAM
Four Minnesota State University Moorhead biotechnology program faculty received a $116,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to purchase imaging and injector instruments for its computerized florescence microscope that’s used for cell research and study.

The department acquired the $24,000 microscope last year with another NSF grant.

The microscopy equipment includes a digital video camera to view and record cellular activity along with software and computers to analyze data. Also included is a cell injector system to introduce compounds into cells in an effort to identify on-off switches required for cell growth and division.
Biology professor Ellen Brisch, who led the collaborative grant proposal, said this state-of-the-art equipment will raise the quality of teaching and research in cellular biology for both students and faculty.

Besides Brisch, MSUM biology professors Chris Chastain and Mark Waller along with chemistry professor Joseph Provost—all involved in cellular research and teaching—participated in writing the grant proposal.

During the past year these four faculty members, along with Shawn Dunkirk, associate dean of the College of Social and Natural Sciences, have received four NSF grants totaling more than $500,000 to support research and educational programs.

The equipment will primarily be used by upper division science and research students along with biotechnology majors. It will also be available to regional high school students who visit MSUM through outreach programs in cell biology, molecular biology and biochemistry.

ED MILLS NAMED MSUM'S
NEW DEAN OF EDUCATION
AND HUMAN SERVICES
Dr. Ed Mills, a professor of education in the department of urban leadership and policy studies at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, has been named dean of education and human services at Minnesota State University Moorhead.

As one of four academic deans at MSUM, Mills will supervise the university’s teacher education unit, divided into separate academic departments: Elementary and Early Childhood Education; Counseling, Education Leadership, Foundations and Field Experiences; and Special Education.

He’ll also oversee the New Center for Multidisciplinary Studies; the departments of Nursing, Social Work, and Health and Physical Education; the Regional Science Center; and the MSUM Center for Early Childhood Education.

A 30-year veteran educator, Mills, originally from Kansas City, began his career as a high school history teacher in suburban Kansas City and then served the next two decades as a principal and superintendent at rural and suburban Missouri school districts before moving into higher education..

A specialist in school law, Mills, 52, earned his doctorate at the University of Missouri and returned to his alma mater six years ago to teach education after stints as a college relations director at Kansas City’s Metropolitan Community Colleges and as an associate professor and department head at South Dakota State University’s School of Education graduate programs.

Last year Mills received the Northland (Missouri) Area Chamber of Commerce Award for Excellence in Higher Education and, the year before that, the Missouri Governor’s Council on Disability’s Educator of the Year Award.

He officially began his duties July 1.

Promoted to professor status: Mary Bader and Cindy Phillips, accounting department; Jim Bense, English; Patrick Coppens, speech-language-hearing sciences; Nathan Davis, music; Gary Edvenson, chemistry; Oscar Flores, economics; John Hall, languages; Dennis Jacobs, New Center for Multidisciplinary Studies; and Dennis Van Berkum, counseling, education leadership, foundations and field experiences.

Promoted to associate professor: Anna Arnar, art and design; Timothy Borchers, speech and theatre; Jan Fiola, sociology and criminal justice; Glenn Ginn and Rodney Rothlisberger, music; Steven Hoffbeck, history; Suzanne Hungerford, speech-language-hearing sciences; Paul Kramer, political science; Barbara Matthees, nursing; Elizabeth Nawrot, psychology; Joseph Provost, chemistry; Mary Schroeder, social work; and SuEllen Shaw, English.

MSUM’S MACDONALD
IN KAZAKHSTAN
TEACHING FOR USAID
Alan MacDonald, a professor of business administration at Minnesota State University Moorhead, will be teaching principles of marketing in Almaty, Kazakhstan this summer under a contract issued through the United States Agency for International Development.

He’ll be teaching professors from the former Soviet Union state the basic concepts of marketing in a capitalistic system.
MacDonald is serving as an independent consultant under CARANA Corporation, a Washington, D.C.,-based international management consulting firm, working through USAID’s Business and Economics Education Project in Central Asia.

MacDonald, who’ll be in teach there from July 23 through Aug. 10, left this week. He’s had previous overseas teaching experience in China, Great Britain, Japan, Papua New Guinea, Liberia and in the U.S. Virgin Islands

Kazakhstan is situated in Central Asia, deep in the Eurasian continent, with a population of 15 million.

Shimabukuro, who’ll be stationed at the University College of Education in Winneba, is one of about 2,000 U.S. grantees who will travel abroad during the 2001-2001 academic year through the Fulbright program. Established in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late Sen. J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, the program’s purpose is to build mutual understanding between the peoples of the United States and the rest of the world.

Shimabukuro, a specialist in science education joined the MSUM faculty in 1966 and recently served as chair of the university’s biology department. She expects to leave this fall for her 10-month assignment in Ghana.

Each of the 34 institutions proposed its own increase to the Board of Trustees, which recently voted on the tuition increases as part of a $921 million budget for the current fiscal year. The budget was approved 13-2.

Tuition at the two-year state community and technical colleges will go up by an average of $241 or 11.2 percent for full-time students, resulting in an average annual tuition of $2,400.

The four-year state universities will increase tuition by an average of $279 or 10.0 percent next year, bringing the average tuition for full-time students to $3,070.

The Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system is made up of 34 state universities, community colleges and technical colleges and serves about 216,500 students annually in credit-based courses. The system's projected 2000-2001 full-year-equivalent enrollment is 118,000 students.
FY2002 Undergraduate Tuition for Full Time Student (taking 30 credits)

Institution/FY2001 Annual Tuition/FY2002 Annual Tuition/$ change/% change

STATE UNIVERSITIES

Bemidji SU        $2,954 $3,470 $516 17.5%

Metro SU            $2,753 $2,918 $165 6.0%

MSU Mankato    $2,700 $3,050 $350 13.0%

MSU Moorhead $2,686 $2,874 $188 7.0%

Southwest SU $2,790 $3,068 $278 9.9%

St. Cloud SU      $2,784 $3,063 $279 10.0%

Winona SU        $2,850 $3,110 $260 9.1%

Average             $2,791 $3,070 $279 10.0%