Resolutions for the ‘new Southern’

 
During difficult times at Southern University key figures on campus make resolutions for change towards the new Southern University.
Key figures including the Southern University at Baton Rouge Chancellor, SU System President, Board of Supervisors Chairman and the Faculty Senate President made resolutions for their respective offices.
“I plan to commit myself personally to have a total commitment to the university and the students. I want to be able to fully commit myself to what I have to do,” SUBR Chancellor James Llorens said.
While Chancellor Llorens’ resolution is a personal one SU System President Ronald Mason’s is a collective effort.
“My new year’s wish is that the family continues to come together. The Southern Nation is a beautiful thing but has recently gone through some very trying times both from the inside and the outside,” Mason said.
Mason continued discussing the abilities of the Jaguar Nation, “The outside battles I think we can manage as long as we are not fighting inside battles. Nobody can win a two-front war and a house divided can never stand. I wish that the family will continue to come together with a common vision and a common cause,” Mason said.
Board of Supervisors Chairman Darren Mire hopes that the Board of Supervisors will create a new, stronger and more competitive Southern University system.​
“I want to work with the Board of Supervisors together to grow our Southern University system into a system unlike any in the country. We are always classified as the only HBCU system in the country,” Mire said.​”And at some point in time we have to take that HBCU brand and make it a global brand, we have to stay true to our mission at the same time in order to survive this world of higher education you have to change your frame of mind and change your culture.”​
Mire proposed a way to re-brand the SU system.
“You have to change your brand to compete; online education, technology, diversity, research, all are part of higher education and we need to make sure we stay strong in all of those higher education categories. Our Board needs to work not only to come out of this financial emergency but to grow the system and re-brand it as a new Southern University,” Mire proposed.
Faculty Senate President Sudhir Trivedi hope to focus on exigency in his faculty legislative body.
“My emphasis will be to do everything to deflect the impact of financial exigency. Termination of tenured faculty members was expected. The way it is being done is unacceptable,” Trivedi said.
​Trivedi hopes to gain administration support in an effort to understand the exigency sacrifices to be made.
“I want the administration if a faculty member has to be terminated what are the reasons for that decision. There needs to be criteria for faculty members to terminated or kept,” Trivedi said.
Trivedi further resolves that the Faculty Senate gains input valuable to the re-organization process.
“The concept of faculty input is misunderstood. What these administrators are doing needs to be brought to the faculty senate. The faculty senate needs to discuss it, deliberate on it and make recommendations for action. At least there should be in writing that these are the faculty senate’s recommendations,” Trivedi said.
Director of Student Health and Nurse Practitioner Shirley Wade hopes for a sense of community in awareness of health and wellness.
“I would like to see to have a comprehensive collaborative campus wide approach to health and wellness. People fail to realize that if you don’t have healthy students you don’t have classes, programs. We intersect every area of campus,” Wade said.
Director of Center for Student Success Nadia Gadson aims for a bigger and better approach.
“I think if we continue to do what we have been doing bigger and better within the confines of our resources. We continue to plan, prepare, and pursue those things that are going to help retain and graduate students,” Gadson said.
Residential Life Director Shandon Neal wants to cater to student clientele.
“I want to take the services we provide to another level basically to create a wow factor with our student population. Next school year we plan to have room assignments to your e-mail by early June. We are also moving to an online maintenance format to be able to go to the website and put in your maintenance requests and track it. We think it raises the level of accountability and we want to be accountable to our client base,” said Neal.​