Sharing campus easy for SUBR, SUNO

After days of adjustments and tweaking, the extended registration period at Southern University-Baton Rouge will officially end today, according to Norman St. Amant, SU vice chancellor for enrollment management.
The period, which was extended from Aug. 12, was installed to accommodate students displaced from colleges shut down due to Hurricane Katrina. Extended registration was also available for current students who did not complete the scheduling of their classes.
“We have no way of knowing how many people will come,” St. Amant said. “But we will be here until every student that wants to attend Southern University is enrolled.”
Despite the registration extension and other delays that might have been as residual from Katrina, St. Amant said the future could only get brighter from such a tragedy.
“It’s a bad thing that’s happened, but some good things are coming from it,” St. Amant said. “If we weren’t optimistic then we wouldn’t be here.”
St. Amant said the university expects nearly 500 students from New Orleans area colleges to enroll, but Gladys Allen, registrar at Southern University at New Orleans said she is looking forward to all 4,000 of SUNO’s students to make the main campus in Baton Rouge their new home.
“Our enrollment at SUNO was the highest it’s ever been,” Allen said. “I expect to see all of our students here.”
Allen said she was glad to be at Southern and she is confident that every student would be served.
“I know everyone here at Southern,” Allen said. “I’ve been helping and I know that everything is being done to help the students.”
For New Orleans freshman nursing major Christina Rose, a transfer student from Delgado Community College, coming to Southern was already something she had in mind.
“I planned on transferring here next semester,” Rose said. “In a way, it’s a good thing, I’m just coming sooner than expected.”
English professor JoAnn Marx said she thinks it is a wonderful thing the university is doing to ensure displaced students do not lose their educational opportunities.
“I think we should do what we can to help people,” Marx said. “We should be there for them. It may offer a little hardship, but it will be okay.”
Johnny Anderson, chairman of the SU Board of Supervisors, said the system was enthusiastic about taking care of students from New Orleans area schools.
“We are optimistic,” Anderson said. “We understand that we may have suffered a lot of damages on the New Orleans campus, but we are looking into ways to make certain that the students from that area are taken care of.”
SU System Interim President and SUBR Chancellor Edward Jackson said that the university would be extending itself to do everything to help.
“The enormity of this thing has caught everyone by surprise,” Jackson said. “Our first priority is to make sure that kids enrolled in New Orleans are taken care of and we are happy to do so.”
Lisa Smith, a sophomore political science major from Baton Rouge said she is happy to see the university embracing the displaced students.
“It’s definitely going to be crowded, but I think we can adjust especially since it’s in the spirit of helping others,” Smith said. “I’m happy that we are doing it.”