Presidential Updates

Clif’s Notes for May 11, 2021

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At this week’s Board of Governors meeting, I will present the Executive Budget Committee’s FY2022 budget recommendations to the board.

These recommendations include $7.5 million in benefit and compensation increases.

Among these increases is a 3% across-the-board compensation increase.

If approved by the board, this increase will go into effect:

  • On July 1 for all full-time, 12-month employees.
  • On Aug. 1 for all full-time, 9-month employees.

Only employees who are full-time on or before May 31, 2021 will receive the increase.

Cost-of-living increases

Compensation is important. With this in mind, the board and I have worked to provide cost-of-living salary increases throughout my presidency.

Unfortunately, the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic made it impossible to provide a cost-of-living pay increase last July.

The 3% pay increase recommended by the Executive Budget Committee, combined with the $600 across-the-board increase that went into effect earlier this year, recognizes the increased living costs our employees have faced since we were last able to budget a cost-of-living pay increase in July 2019.

Funding priorities for the committee

The Executive Budget Committee’s recommendations also include:

  • Enhanced dental plan benefits for employees (a Faculty Senate and Staff Senate priority for this year).
  • Salary range adjustments.
  • A minimum wage increase.
  • Salary increases under the professor salary incentive program.
  • Faculty promotions.

At the request of many members of the Executive Budget Committee, the recommendations will also restore a substantial portion of travel budgets throughout the university and unfreeze many of the currently frozen faculty and staff positions.

The Executive Budget Committee also recommended increases for several university programs, services and initiatives, including:

  • $65,000 for LinkedIn Learning.
  • More than $300,000 in technology upgrades.
  • $120,000 in additional student recruitment travel costs.
  • $300,000 in diversity and inclusion initiatives.

Board will vote in June

I will present these recommendations for discussion at the Board of Governors Finance and Facilities Committee meeting May 12.

The Board will vote on the FY2022 budget at its June meeting.

Thanks for all you do for Missouri State!

Clif’s Notes for May 4, 2021

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We have made history at Missouri State over the past 20 years.

Milestones include adopting the public affairs mission, changing the university’s name, and establishing IDEA Commons and a campus in China.

More recently we fought for funding, advocated for new programs outside of our traditional mission, and leaned into public private partnership opportunities.

We have been the second largest public university in the state for some time. However, we have become more recognized and respected over the last 10 years. Our reputation and profile has grown, and our influence is greater.

These things didn’t just happen. We made them happen.

The same will be true as we look toward the future. We cannot just wait for our next successes to happen. We must make them happen.

Embracing big ideas

When we began working on our next long-range plan, we decided to infuse it with our entrepreneurial spirit and take a little different path in its development and presentation.

Our plans in the past have been good. They have helped us become who we are today as an institution.

For our next plan we wanted to go farther. We wanted to create a new plan that doesn’t just tell people what to do. We want the plan to inspire our faculty, staff and students. We envisioned a plan that allows everyone in the university community to dream bigger.

I challenged the steering committee to embrace big ideas, and they have crafted a long-range plan that does just that.

Review the 2021-26 plan

See yourself in the stories

Our past plans laid out lists of things we will accomplish over the next five years. You will not see that in our 2021-26 Long-Range Plan.

You will instead see a plan that tells stories and gives examples of big ideas that will guide our decisions and our reality over the next five years.

We want you to see yourselves, your units and departments in the stories. We want the stories to evoke emotional reactions (positive or negative), inspire other ideas and help you think of ways you can contribute to the future of our university.

Unlike a top-down list of instructions and action items, this plan allows more people at the university to be creative and develop their own initiatives, programs and ideas.

Building action plans

This doesn’t mean we will wholly abandon lists of action items. The long-range plan will have metrics. We will still work through our central process of developing an annual action plan with bulleted lists of action items organized under the themes set forth in the long-range plan.

Each division throughout the university will be responsible for developing their own lists of action items that align with the themes of the plan.

We will all continue to be held accountable for completing the tasks set forth in these traditional organizational documents.

These are important processes for linear thinkers (like me). However, our long-range plan will appeal to and elicit buy-in from a broader, more diverse group of people.

The long-range plan will exist as a creative sketch of our future. It will provoke and drive the action items, initiatives and programs that will make our future happen.

Presenting the long-range plan

We will present the long-range plan to the Board of Governors in May, and they will vote on it at their meeting in June.

In the meantime, we’d like your feedback as we finalize the plan. If you missed last week’s town hall meeting on the long-range plan, you can view a recording of the presentation online.

Once you have viewed that presentation, if you have ideas or thoughts you’d like to share, please email them to me at president@missouristate.edu.

Thanks for all you do for Missouri State!

Clif’s Notes for April 27, 2021

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Throughout the year, our Long-Range Plan Steering Committee has collected information and regularly met to develop the university’s 2021-26 Long-Range Plan.

They have developed four themes for the plan:

  1. Evolving academic directions for future careers.
  2. Global engagement.
  3. Inclusive excellence driving university success.
  4. Community leadership and partnerships.

Each theme includes focus areas fleshed out with stories. Our goal is to develop a plan that all members of the university community can plug into as we develop annual action plans in the coming years.

Review the 2021-26 Long-Range Plan

Share your feedback at town hall

The steering committee, our leadership team and the Board of Governors need your feedback as we develop and finalize the 2021-26 Long-Range Plan.

Please attend the university-wide Virtual Town Hall meeting at 3 p.m. this Friday, April 30. We will present the themes, focus areas and stories to you and solicit your input.

You can find the Zoom link and other information about the meeting on the town hall webpage.

Updating the board on COVID impact

Last week the Board of Governors met.

I presented an update on COVID-19. Our numbers on campus and in the community continue to trend in the right direction.

We have administered more than 15,000 vaccinations on campus. The Springfield community’s vaccination rate now exceeds 25%, and the city has removed occupancy restrictions for most activities and events.

Approving tuition and fees

The board also approved our 2021-22 tuition and fees.

The Springfield campus in-state undergraduate tuition rate will be $257 per credit hour. As I previously discussed, this is a blended rate under which seated and online classes will have the same tuition.

We requested and received a waiver from Commissioner of Higher Education Zora Mulligan to restructure our tuition in this way without incurring a financial penalty under the state’s Higher Education Student Funding Act.

Other tuition and fee highlights include:

  • No changes to dual credit, college fees, program fees and parking fees.
  • Only two supplemental course fee changes (TCM 121 and 122).
  • A combined room and board increase of 2.15% with a rate freeze in Monroe and Sunvilla apartments.
  • A $2 per credit hour increase for in-state tuition on the West Plains campus.

Board approves purchases

The board awarded a contract to Slate by Technolutions for a comprehensive technology customer relationship management platform for enrollment management and student services.

The board also approved the purchase of an x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy system at the Roy Blunt Jordan Valley Innovation Center.

Bonds refinanced

The board approved resolutions related to the refinancing of three sets of bonds.

The original financing occurred in:

  • 2014 for the O’Reilly Clinical Health Sciences Center and the Davis-Harrington Welcome Center.
  • 2015 for JQH Arena.
  • 2019 for Brick City buildings 1, 3, 4 and 5.

The university will save more than $4 million by refinancing these bonds.

Building expansions and renovations

The board awarded a $1.3 million contract to BP Builders, LLC to expand and relocate the Multicultural Resource Center. The project will also include renovations to the office of student engagement in the PSU.

The board also awarded a $300,000 contract to Kenmar Construction, Inc. to replace the gymnasium floor at Foster Rec Center.

Finally, the board approved a resolution to name the new outdoor facility currently under construction the John Goodman Amphitheatre. John Goodman is an accomplished alumnus of MSU and has made several large gifts to support the Reynolds College of Arts and Letters and the arts park project.

Thanks for all you do for Missouri State!

 

Clif’s Notes for April 20, 2021

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In June 2019 we began a master planning process for the College of Natural and Applied Sciences (CNAS). After months of discovery, analysis and option development, the final report was issued on Sept. 1, 2020.

The plan establishes three goals:

  1. Provide for the future of CNAS.
  2. Enable research.
  3. Increase visibility for science.

CNAS operations are spread across Temple Hall, Cheek Hall, Kemper Hall and King Street Annex. All four of these facilities need extensive work to meet the goals set forth above.

I am pleased to report that we have begun work to identify funding for the first critical CNAS project: an expansion and renovation of Temple Hall.

Temple Hall renovation

Temple Hall houses classrooms, labs, and offices to support the university’s biology, chemistry, geography, geology and other STEM programs.

Temple Hall was built in 1971 and has not been substantially remodeled since it was constructed. It is in critical need of maintenance and repair.

Moreover, MSU’s enrollment in the sciences has grown from 1,000 to 2,400 since Temple Hall was constructed. This includes a doubling of graduate enrollment in CNAS over the last 25 years.

Additional space is needed to meet CNAS’s educational and research needs.

The CNAS Master Plan proposes a 66,000 square foot, 4-story addition to Temple Hall. The plan also proposes to renovate 40,000 square feet of existing lab space and 48,000 square feet of existing classroom, office and common space in Temple Hall.

The Temple Hall addition will cost $40 million, and the renovation of existing space in Temple Hall will cost an additional $20 million.

Gaining support

I and other members of our team have begun to speak with state and federal lawmakers about this project.

Specifically:

  • I met with Sen. Roy Blunt during the first week of April and discussed this project.
  • Ryan DeBoef and Matt Morris testified about this project in Jefferson City last week at the invitation of the Missouri House Subcommittee on Federal Stimulus Spending.
  • Yesterday we also submitted the Temple Hall project to Commissioner of Higher Education Zora Mulligan as MSU’s highest priority for federal stimulus appropriations.
  • We are working with COPHE to submit the Temple Hall project directly to Gov. Mike Parson’s office as well.

The United States and the State of Missouri currently have access to unprecedented one-time funds. Our goal in the coming months is to work to match federal and state funds with private contributions and university reserves to fund this project.

Community Project Funding

MSU has a strong history of federal investment.

Over the past several weeks, a new federal funding opportunity has emerged. Through Community Project Funding requests, members of the U.S. House and U.S. Senate will soon have the ability to seek congressionally directed spending for high priority projects.

Given the limited nature of Community Project Funding in its first year, we have not yet submitted a formal federal appropriation request for the Temple Hall project. However, we have submitted requests for three smaller projects:

  1. A refractory composite component braider facility expansion that will be part of the Roy Blunt Jordan Valley Innovation Center.
  2. Expansion plans for the Darr Agricultural Center.
  3. A welding lab facility renovation project at the Broadway Building in West Plains.

Ozarks Transportation Organization (OTO) has also submitted a request for renovation of the Grand Street Underpass on our Springfield campus. We support this request and will advocate for it with our federal delegation.

We will continue to meet with our federal delegation and their staffs to advocate for these and other important university projects.

Thanks for all you do for Missouri State!

Clif’s Notes for April 13, 2021

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Last Thursday and Friday we partnered with city and state officials to host a mega mass vaccination event on campus.

I participated in a press conference with Gov. Mike Parson and Sen. Roy Blunt on Thursday morning promoting the event. We also promoted it through social media and our other communication channels in the days leading up to the event.

I am proud to report that our efforts were successful: 6,131 people were vaccinated at the mass vaccination event. This is in addition to the 7,500 plus COVID-19 vaccinations we have administered so far this year at Magers Health and Wellness Center.

Changes in community

City Council has established the next phase in the City of Springfield’s Road to Recovery plan. This plan eliminates occupancy limits for most activities and events if the following criteria are met:

  • Under 40 new COVID-19 cases per day.
  • Under 50 COVID-19 patients hospitalized.
  • 25% of residents age 16 and over vaccinated.

You can find more information on the Road to Recovery plan and our community’s progress on the Springfield-Greene County Health Department’s COVID-19 Dashboard.

The Springfield community is averaging far less than 40 new COVID-19 cases per day and 50 COVID-19 patients hospitalized. However, our community’s vaccination rate remains under the 25 percent threshold.

Please join me in encouraging people to get vaccinated. Vaccination will allow us to move into the next phase of the city’s recovery plan.

Vaccination is also critical to protect the health and safety of our campus community as we approach the end of the semester, commencement ceremonies and other events.

Thanks for all you do for Missouri State!