Recent Town Hall meeting, next week’s SACSCOC visit, and assistance for Hays Cooper Center

Dear Colleagues,

Thank you to all who attended the recent Town Hall meeting focused on next week’s SACS-COC visit on campus and also Delta State’s Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). If you were unable to attend, you can review a copy of the PowerPoint presentation, as well as a recording of the meeting, at this link.

I appreciate the great presentations by our new SACS liaison, Dr. Valarie Morgan, and our QEP Chair, Dr. Tanya McKinney. I also say a special thanks to the many faculty, staff, and students who contributed to our document submission to SACS and to developing our clever QEP topic.

As I mentioned in the Town Hall meeting, many people on campus will likely not have interaction with the members of the SACS visiting team who will be on campus next week; however, if you do, please help to make them feel welcome. Their role is to help us better ourselves, and we want them to have a positive experience while on campus.

The main thing you can do is familiarize yourself with the QEP topic. You can obtain information from the PowerPoint presentation and/or recording provided at the link above, or by reviewing information at the QEP site.

The next Town Hall meeting (and last one this semester) is scheduled for Tuesday, April 23, 2024, at 3:00 p.m. in Jacob Conference Center in Ewing Hall. At this meeting, I will share with the campus community the budget plan for FY25, which will include the plan for program changes and unit restructuring. As always, I will answer questions at the end of the presentation in an effort to help everyone understand the process used for making the necessary changes, as well as to provide a clear picture of Delta State’s future.

You have likely heard about the tragic incident that occurred at Hayes Cooper School in Merigold yesterday morning. As a result of the incident, their school building will be unusable for several weeks. As a community and education partner, Delta State will provide classroom spaces in Ewing Hall, Caylor Hall, and Walters Hall for 327 of their K-6 students. They will begin coming to campus on Tuesday, April 16, and will have classes on our campus from 8:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. each weekday. If you are in these spaces and encounter one of their faculty, staff, or students, please help them to feel welcome. This is a difficult time for all of them, and we want to do what we can to ease the transition for them and help them feel at home on our campus.

Regards,

Dan Ennis