Tyrone Croom '97 and Tammara Williams '97 were among the students who received bachelor's degrees at the University' 139th commencement. |
Capital Campaign Kicks Off
The University launched a new $35 million capital campaign, Susquehanna 2000: The Next Challenge, with a gala dinner-dance in April. The event followed a day of events focusing on student and faculty achievements. As of August 31, 1997, the campaign had received gifts, pledges and intentions to give of more than $22.1 million. The total included record-breaking commitments of more than $500,000 from the University's faculty and staff and $9.5 million from members of the board. Geared to priorities established through a campus-wide needs assessment and master plan, the campaign will fund increased endowment for financial aid, the library, technology and equipment, and faculty and curricular development. It will also underwrite new facilities for business and communications, sports and recreation, student housing, classroom and laboratory enhancements, and ongoing support for the Susquehanna University Fund.
Outside Recognition
The educational quality and value of a Susquehanna education has once again been recognized in current editions of selective college guides. While campus visits continue to be the best way to choose a college, many students and parents consult guides to help narrow their search. The guides provide information on factors such as academic reputation, student retention, faculty, student selectivity, and endowment. Susquehanna has again this year been cited in The Yale Insider's Guide to the Colleges, The Princeton Review's Student Advantage Guide to the Best 311 Colleges, Barron's Best Buys in College Education and Compact Guide to Colleges, and U.S. News and World Report's "America's Best Colleges."
Corporate Communications Program Debuts
A new undergraduate program in corporate communications, one of just a few in Pennsylvania, is offering an additional option to communications majors. The new program will prepare students for careers in areas such as employee communications, investor relations, consumer relations and advertising. The interdisciplinary emphasis is based in the Department of Communications and Theatre Arts. Students will also minor in business or include a minimum of ten semester hours in specific business courses through the University's Sigmund Weis School of Business. The business school and the communications department will be jointly housed in a proposed new building to be funded by proceeds from the current Susquehanna 2000: The Next Challenge capital campaign. The project will also provide a major technology center for the entire campus.
Study Abroad Sets a Record
A record number of Susquehanna students studied abroad in the 1996-97 academic year. One hundred and sixteen students and 13 faculty members traveled to 41 separate locations from Greece to Australia. Participation grew by 31 percent over the previous year, with juniors making up a large majority. The total included 22 Sigmund Weis School of Business students participating in the school's Fall Semester-in-London program for junior business majors. Ten other students traveled with a three-member faculty team to South America for two weeks of study and travel in January in the University's interdisciplinary "Focus: Ecuador" program.
New Writing Concentration
A new major in writing at Susquehanna offers an in-depth study option for students interested in careers as writers, editors, publishers, and in other language-related occupations. Offered through the Department of English, the program focuses on workshop courses and independent writing projects with supporting courses in literature and grammar and usage. Participants work closely with faculty mentors specializing in their area of interest. Early development of a writing portfolio is stressed to assist students planning to apply to graduate school. To help students gain practical experience, the concentration includes internships and practica, student readings, and writing for publications including The Susquehanna Review, the campus literary magazine and Liminal Spaces, the Writer's Institute newsletter.
Business School Increases Technology Requirements
Reflecting the growing use of computer technology in the workplace and graduate schools, the University's Sigmund Weis School of Business has quadrupled the computer and information technology requirements for accounting, economics and business administration majors. The change will help prepare students for emerging career opportunities in fields such as business systems analysis where job prospects are projected to grow by more than 50 percent in the next five years according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor. The four-year module focuses on the use of information technology for strategic and competitive business advantage. It includes courses in personal productivity, database management, network computing and hands-on system development.
Art and Music Enrich Campus Life
Eric Connor '97 prepares for the stage in the student production of Crazy for You. |
A generous gift by Joseph and Ann Silbaugh of more than 1,600 French advertising posters provided a major addition to the University's permanent collection and an exciting spring exhibition for the Lore Degenstein Gallery. The 1996-97 exhibition schedule also featured Stone Echoes: Original Prints by Francoise Gilot, artist and mother of two of Pablo Picasso's children, and Mark Rothko: The Spirit of Myth, on loan from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
An outstanding performance by the Barbican Piano Trio presented by the Stella Freeman Weis Cultural Endowment was one of many musical highlights in a season marked by a well-received Artist Series and numerous faculty and student recitals. Student talents took to the stage with productions of Playing for Time, The Heidi Chronicles and the classic George Gershwin musical Crazy for You.
A video recording of the University's annual Christmas Candlelight Service has been nominated for an Emmy Award in the Outstanding Entertainment Broadcast category by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. Recorded in December 1996 by Wilkes-Barre public broadcasting affiliate WVIA-TV, the program will be offered for national telecast during the 1997 holiday season. Copies of the video are also available for purchase through the campus bookstore.
Honored Guests Share Their Views
The University presented honorary degrees to commencement speaker Kathleen Jamieson, dean of the Annenberg School for Communications at the University of Pennsylvania, and baccalaureate speaker Nathan Fishbane, professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Chicago. P. Sue Perrotty, executive vice president and chief information technology officer for CoreStates Financial Corporation, presented the annual Sigmund Weis Memorial Lecture. Students, faculty and community members also welcomed visits by Lawrence Langer, Simmons College professor emeritus and author of several books on the Holocaust; and nonfiction authors Esmeralda Santiago and Lorene Cary and poets Deborah Burnham and Marjorie Maddox in the 1996-97 Visiting Writer Series.
Career Center Emphasizes Experience
Experience-based education, a primary hiring criterion for many employers, remains a top priority with the University's Center for Career Services. One hundred and forty-three Susquehanna students participated in internships and 83 in externships in 1996-97. The total is six percent over the previous year and tripled since 1991. Initiatives for the year included "Power Dining," a popular etiquette workshop for juniors and seniors preparing for job interviews. The year also saw dramatic growth in use of the Susquehanna Computerized Career Express Search Service (SUCCESS), an in-house electronic resume data bank designed to match students with job opportunities posted by employers. Twenty-four alumni and 320 students shared questions and advice at the fifth annual Networking Career Fair.
A Commitment to Service
An orientation day of volunteering once again benefited organizations such as the Selinsgrove Senior Citizens Center. |
A commitment to volunteer service remained a hallmark of a Susquehanna education in 1996-97. Nearly three-quarters of Susquehanna's students contributed more than 37,352 hours of service according to the University's Center for Volunteer Programs and Service Learning. The total included 16,632 hours by members of the University's eight fraternities and sororities organized as Greeks in Service and 18,480 hours by members of Susquehanna's 12 volunteer Project Houses. America Reads became the University's newest Project House, joining veteran groups such as Arts Alive, Senior Friends and Habitat for Humanity. Three hundred students contributed more than 3,000 hours in service learning courses ranging from Spanish for the Service Professions to Environmental Hazards. Incoming first-year students and members of the University faculty and staff once again marked orientation with a day of community service in various locations throughout the campus and the town of Selinsgrove.
Library Use Sets New Records
Library use is setting new records and new patterns at Susquehanna as students and faculty increasingly turn to electronic resources to acquire information. Collective use of print, microform, media and electronic resources at the Blough-Weis Library increased 18 percent over the previous year. The number of volumes in the collection -- 245,000 - and the number of current periodical subscriptions -- 1,442 -- are both at an all-time high. Book circulation and interlibrary loan also set records, while in-library use of books and periodicals decreased. Extensive electronic databases, available through the Internet from any networked computer on campus, are quicker, easier and often produce more results than traditional print sources. The University has expanded access to the FirstSearch service, which provides citations, abstracts and, in many cases, full articles from a rapidly growing list of databases around the world.
Library staff members continue to help train students in information retrieval skills and to assist faculty to incorporate new instructional technology into courses. A teleconferencing center has been installed in the lower level of the library, partially funded by a federal grant to the Center for Agile Pennsylvania Learning.
Athletic Success at Home and Abroad
Athletic highlights for the year included Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) championships in golf and men's track. The year also brought outstanding success for many individual athletes, including men's tennis captain and 1997 honors graduate Carlos Albertotti, the only MAC spring athlete to be named an Academic All-American. The University's Crusader football team got a head start on the 1997-98 season, winning a spring exhibition game against the Aschaffenburg Stallions in Frankfurt, Germany.
Strong Giving Breaks SUF Record
Nearly 5,000 alumni, parents, and friends donated a record $1.25 million to the Susquehanna University Fund (SUF) during the 1996-97 fiscal year. The total is more than four percent higher than the previous year and the fifth straight all-time high for the fund. Gifts to the SUF fund scholarships, library acquisitions, academic programs and other important priorities through direct support of the operating budget. Total giving to the University in the 1996-97 academic year, including gifts for the Susquehanna 2000: The Next Challenge capital campaign, exceeded $5 million.