One of our end-of-the-year rituals at Fort Hays State University is to thank the leadership of our faculty, staff, and student senates and welcome the new leaders \u201cto the table.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\nam so grateful to my Presidents\u2019 Roundtable colleagues (presidents of the\nuniversity, faculty senate, staff senate, and student government) for their\ntime and effort in helping me lead the university through a challenging year.\nTogether, we discussed the work of our individual groups, expanded our\nperspectives as an integrated team, created opportunities for further\ncollaboration, and enhanced campus communication.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Joining\nme as members of the 2020-2021 FHSU Presidents\u2019 Roundtable were Dr. Kevin\nSplichal, associate professor of Advanced Education Programs, who served with\nexcellence as the faculty senate president; Jennifer Whitmer, senior\nadministrative assistant for the Department of Social Work, who did such a\ngreat job that she was re-elected to serve a second term; and Haley Reiter, our\noutstanding student body president. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Haley,\nby the way, is off to New Mexico for a summer internship at the Vermejo Park\nRanch and will begin her senior year this fall in Belgium. A tourism and\nhospitality management major, Haley is taking advantage of internships,\nco-curricular experiences, and study abroad to build her college portfolio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As\nmuch as I will miss Kevin and Haley, I am very excited to work with our new\ngovernance leaders. Together, we will not only lead our campus, but we will\neach chair the Kansas Board of Regents Councils: the Council of Presidents, the\nCouncil of Faculty Senate Presidents, the Students\u2019 Advisory Committee, and the\nStaff Senate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\nwant to share a bit about the members of the 2021-2022 Fort Hays State Presidents\u2019\nRoundtable:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
New\nStudent Body President Mark Faber just completed his undergraduate degree with\na bachelor\u2019s in biology (pre-med) and a double minor in chemistry and\npsychology. In addition to the Student Government Association, Mark has been\ninvolved with the American Healthy Heart Association and the Fort Hays State\nHonor Society. He is an accomplished pole vaulter for our track and field team.\nThis next year, he will begin work on a master\u2019s degree in biology and complete\na second bachelor\u2019s degree in psychology before heading off to medical school.\nThrough all of these endeavors, Mark has earned many awards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He\nis excited about serving as our student body president. His main focus is to\nincrease student engagement \u2013 particularly following an academic year stifled\nby COVID-19 challenges. Mark\u2019s overarching goal is for all students to\nexperience the close-knit community at FHSU that he has.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mark is the third youngest of four boys. Mark shared: \u201cLiving with all boys meant that everything was a competition, and we love competing in everything that we do. My family and I love to play board and card games. My friends and I recently have started playing spike ball and hackeysack and absolutely love those two games. Often, my friends and I will go longboarding to relax and spend quality time with each other. I also love helping younger kids develop a passion for school and doing well. The Fort Hays State Honor Society does a program called honor pals, where members go to a local elementary school and play or tutor kids.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr.\nJanet Stramel, professor of Teacher Education, is the Edna Shutts Williams\nEndowed Chair in the College of Education. She teaches mathematics teaching\nmethods courses for pre-service teachers. As an endowed chair, she receives\nfunding to conduct research regarding how best to train elementary teachers in\nscience, technology, engineering, and mathematics. She just finished her 12th\nyear at FHSU. Her quality efforts have resulted in several recognitions: the\nUniversity Service Award; the College of Education Teaching Award, Scholarship\nAward, and Service Award; and as a nominee and finalist for the Pilot Award.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr.\nStramel has served on the faculty senate for many years. She started as a\nsenator representing Teacher Education, then was elected secretary for three\nyears (2011-2013 and 2014-2015). She began her service on faculty senate simply\nbecause someone asked her to consider the position. Janet shared \u201cif we are to\ngrow any organization or group, we must ask people to take leadership roles.\u201d I\nagree wholeheartedly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr.\nStramel also shared with me that she loves attending meetings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\nalways learn something and feel like I can contribute to the conversation as\nwell,\u201d she said. \u201cI am looking forward to meeting in person this next year, as\nwe have lost some personal connections through Zoom meetings.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr.\nStramel is married to Dean Stramel, an adjunct instructor in Chemistry. They\nhave four children and three granddaughters. She also serves as the pianist for\nTrinity Lutheran Church. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jennifer\nWhitmer returns for a second year as our staff senate president and has worked\nfor FHSU for 11 years. She currently serves as the administrative assistant in\nthe Department of Social Work. She has also worked in Career Services and for\nLearning Technologies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jennifer\nhas been a member of our staff senate for four years. The first two years we had\ntwo separate staff governance groups, and Jennifer helped merge the two groups.\nAfter the senate combined, she became vice president, and then was elected as\npresident the following year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jennifer\nhas worked hard to ensure an increase in communication and staff awareness. She\nwas \u201crewarded\u201d with a second term as president. Jennifer is a recipient of the\nCollege of Health and Behavioral Sciences Outstanding Staff Award and the My\nGo-To Mentoring award.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jennifer\nis a Hays native, who married her high school sweetheart, John. They have four\nchildren: Jason, who is 8 years old; Jade, 6; Jacob, 4; and Jana, 2 \u2013 all\nsharing the initials J.W.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Other\nmembers of our excellent Fort Hays State leadership teams will also take on\nKBOR responsibilities. Mike Barnett, vice president for Administration and\nFinance, will chair the Council of Business Officers; Dr. Jill Arensdorf,\nprovost and vice president for Academic Affairs, will lead the Council of Chief Academic\nOfficers; Dr. Joey Linn, vice president for Student Affairs, will preside over\nthe Council of Chief Student Affairs Officers; Jennie Rose, legislative\nliaison, and Joe Bain, general counsel, will co-lead the Council of Government\nRelations Officers; and Dr. Teresa Clounch, assistant vice president for Student\nAffairs and Compliance, will convene the Council of Diversity Officers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\nam confident in the progress we will make together in bringing the collective\nvoices of our state-wide colleagues to the Kansas Board of Regents. Together,\nwe will advance the board\u2019s strategic plan to help Kansas families, support\nKansas businesses, and promote economic prosperity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tisa Mason is president of Fort Hays State University.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One of our end-of-the-year rituals at Fort Hays State University is to thank the leadership of our faculty, staff, and student senates and welcome the… <\/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-60149","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\/60149","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=60149"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60150,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60149\/revisions\/60150"}],"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=60149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=60149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=60149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}