{"id":53173,"date":"2020-02-13T05:00:03","date_gmt":"2020-02-13T11:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/?p=53173"},"modified":"2020-02-07T15:23:52","modified_gmt":"2020-02-07T21:23:52","slug":"%ef%bb%bfa-universitys-success-is-rooted-in-the-spirit-of-generosity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/?p=53173","title":{"rendered":"\ufeffA university\u2019s success is rooted in the spirit of generosity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><em>&#8220;Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.\u201d<br> <\/em><strong><em>\u2013 Leo Buscaglia<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p> I love this quote because it captures the essence of Fort Hays State University \u2013 a university centered on creating transformational experiences for our students. Those experiences begin with access, followed by effort, which then leads to transformation. It is a formula resulting in a university that excels at unlocking untapped potential. And at the center of it all is our donors.<br> <br> <strong>Access<\/strong><br> The college choice journey begins with \u201cfit,\u201d affordability, and being an institution of quality. Our donors\u2019 philanthropy to the university has the Journey campaign ahead of schedule \u2013 making college affordable through scholarships and driving academic quality with endowed professorships and support for our academic departments. Donor-initiated projects such as the new Fischli-Wills Center for Student Success propel students to success and enrich the student-athlete experience. The results: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>19 consecutive years of record enrollment (15,908 students)\nand a 12-percent increase in serving more Kansans (8,048) over the past seven\nyears. We serve students in every county in Kansas, every state in the nation\nand every branch of the military. Our on-campus enrollment includes students\nfrom 35 countries and our overall enrollment is represented by students from 53\ncountries.<\/li><li>The Journey campaign has raised $38,605,361 thus far for\nscholarships. Total scholarship funds allocated during the same period was\n$15,619,013.<\/li><li>We are one of a select few universities (less than 10 in the\nnation) to earn certification from the U.S. Distance Learning Association. This\ncertification is based on a thorough, 120-point evaluation administered by\nsenior leaders in distance education. We also earned a top-10-in-the-nation\nranking from Washington Monthly magazine as one of the best colleges for adult\nlearners.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><em>&nbsp;\u201cI want to thank you for your financial\nsupport! I always knew that I wanted to attend a university, but I didn\u2019t think\nit would ever be possible. It is because of people like you that I am here at\nFort Hays State University following my dreams. Thank you!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>\u2013 Joni\nEnns, <\/em><\/strong><em>Satanta junior majoring in agricultural\neducation<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Effort<\/strong><br>\nOne of the enduring concepts in college student success is that of quality of\neffort \u2013 the more effort the student exerts toward the college experience, the\nmore likely the student will not only graduate but truly tap into their talents\nand dreams.<br>\n<br>\nAs a partner in student learning, the university is responsible for investing\nin the quality of the facilities and experiences it offers in order to inspire\na matching quality of effort by its students. Learning is all about that\npartnership.<br>\n<br>\nGenerous philanthropy has made it possible for the university to build new,\nstate-of-the-art facilities and create more powerful experiences for our\nstudents. We thank them all for enabling FHSU to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Offer more than 110 graduate programs and over 70 undergraduate\nmajors;<\/li><li>Engage students through paid internships, scientific fieldwork\nand research, study abroad, varsity athletics, intramural sports, concerts,\ntheatre productions, gallery exhibits, and student clubs and organizations;<\/li><li>Renovate Stoup Hall in partnership with the Dane G. Hansen\nFoundation and Hays Med for a cutting-edge nursing simulation lab; dedicate the\nSchmidt Foundation Center for Art and Design; and break ground this spring for\nthe Fischli-Wills Center for Student Success.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>So far in our Journey campaign,\n22,629 donors have given a total of $92,750,000, and $2,813,293 of those funds\nhave come from 63,427 gifts under $100. That is undeniable proof that every\ngift matters in our mission to unlock the untapped potential of our students\nand help them grow into engaged citizen leaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u201cDr. Beth Walizer, a\nprofessor in teacher education, was and still is very influential in my life.\nShe has a deep passion for teaching and the needs of her students. To this day,\nI still enjoy working with her and bouncing ideas off of her! I&#8217;m proud to be a\nTiger because it&#8217;s full of people who work to make sure FHSU students are\nsuccessful!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>\u2013 Andrew Dempewolf, <\/em><\/strong><em>principal at\nBickerdyke Elementary School, Russell; B.S. in education 2012, M.S. in\neducation administration 2014<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Transformation&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A great education transforms students. Devani\nPrieto\u2019s transformation story started in elementary school, where she met\nsocial worker Michelle Daniel. Devani was born in Juarez, Mexico, and spoke no\nEnglish when she met Michelle at Riley Middle School in Great Bend. At a very\nyoung age, Devani knew that one day she would do for others what Michelle did\nfor her. She too would become a social worker. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At Fort Hays State University, faculty in the\nsocial work program immediately recognized Devani\u2019s determination. For four\nyears, she worked full time, commuting to class from Great Bend several times a\nweek. She graduated summa cum laude in 2018 with a 4.0 GPA. She is now a social\nwork specialist at Larned State Hospital, doing what she believes she was born\nto do \u2013 keeping hope alive for others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Clearly, in living her dream, Devani pays forward the transformational experience that Fort Hays State provided for her \u2013 and that is the impact of a Fort Hays State University education.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p style=\"text-align:right\"><em>Tisa Mason is president of Fort Hays State University.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12323,55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-life","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tigermedianet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Mason-Tisa-040A6662.jpg?fit=750%2C1050&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=53173"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53174,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53173\/revisions\/53174"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=53173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=53173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=53173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}