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September 2018 Announcements

September 2018 Announcements

September 19, 2018 6-min. read
Iron wolf statue
  • Hurricane Florence has greatly impacted our state, and many of our faculty, staff and students. Please review NC State’s hurricane recovery page for available resources and information on ways to engage in relief efforts. The page also includes Chancellor Woodson’s letter to campus as well as details on how NC State is helping across North Carolina.
  • NC State Wellness and Recreation is sponsoring the Step to It Walking Challenge, a walking challenge designed to increase physical activity among faculty, staff and students. The six-week program includes weekly raffle prizes for participants taking at least 10,000 steps per week. Register your team by October 5 — teams may consist of two -10 participants.. The challenge runs October 8 through November 18.
  • In celebration of National Cyber Security Awareness Month in October, the Office of Information Technology, along with the NC State Department of Computer Science, ePartners Program, and NC State Engineering Foundation, will sponsor “Protect the Pack: SecureU,” a series of conversations on the latest cybersecurity trends and threats, effective security measurements and careers in cyberland. Attendees will be equipped to recognize cyber threats and implement safeguards to protect sensitive data. SecureU will feature the following activities:
  • Register now for NCSU Libraries’ fall 2018 Data and Visualization Workshops. Taught by NCSU Libraries staff, the series helps students and researchers gather and present their data in the most compelling ways.
  • Please read NC State Chancellor Randy Woodson’s statement regarding the university’s institutional policies relating to free speech and free expression. You may also review NC State’s Freedom of Speech and Expression Policy and find additional resources on NC State’s Free Speech information page. Questions about free speech and free expression at NC State should be directed to ncsufreespeech@ncsu.edu.
  • For informational and compliance purposes, the university sends annual notifications on topics that are of utmost importance to the NC State community. Please see the University Annual Notifications information page which includes links to all annual notification topic policies, resources and/or additional helpful information. The list of topics includes, but is not limited to: Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination, Title IX, Free Speech, Misuse of State Property, Peer to Peer File Sharing, Drug Free Schools and Workplace, Political Activities, and Employee Excess Liability Insurance. Read the full university message here.
  • NC State has begun to implement the new Enterprise Research Administration system. This system promises to streamline and simplify the complex work of managing research projects, and campus stakeholders will test and refine the system over the coming years.
  • Chip Futrell, director of continuing and professional education at NC State’s McKimmon Center for Extension and Continuing Education, will serve as Interim Vice Provost for Continuing Education, effective October 1, 2018. Futrell will replace Alice Warren, current vice provost for continuing education, who is retiring.
  • September is National Passport Awareness Month. NC State has its own on-campus Passport Services to support the university’s students, faculty, staff, and local community. Learn more about their services and get the answers to some frequently-asked passport-related questions.
  • October 11 is Ombuds Day. Your NC State ombuds – Mike Giancola (Student Ombuds) and Roy Baroff (Faculty and Staff Ombuds) – will be on campus at various locations throughout the day to provide information about ombuds services and to celebrate, including drawings for coffee and ice cream coupons.
  • In the 2018 Appropriations Act, the North Carolina General Assembly granted eligible state employees a one-time additional five days (40 hours) of FY 2018-19 Special Bonus Leave, effective July 1, 2018. This leave will remain available during the length of the employee’s employment. It has no cash value and cannot be paid out at the end of employment or applied to total state service. This 2018-19 Special Bonus Leave also has a leave offsetting provision. If this leave is used in a year when an employee has more than 240 annual leave hours at the end of the calendar year, it will offset the hours that normally would transfer to the employee’s sick leave hours.
  • SHRA and EHRA Annual Raise Process: The Appropriations Act of 2018 provides for compensation increases for employees subject to the North Carolina Human Resources Act (SHRA) and employees exempt from the North Carolina Human Resources Act (EHRA). On August 6, the UNC System Office issued SHRA and EHRA Annual Raise Process (ARP) implementation instructions for system institutions. Both SHRA and EHRA ARP salary increases are subject to the ARP salary increase caps and criteria described in the NC State University 2018 ARP Guidelines. More information on salary increases may be found on NC State’s Budget Central website.

From the Office of Research and Innovation:

  • A research and innovation forum on “Cultivating Interdisciplinary Research” will take place October 11 from 11:15 a.m.-1 p.m. at Talley Student Union. James Cooper, Richard Kuhn, and Ali Shakouri from Purdue University, who have extensive experience in building and managing interdisciplinary research programs and buildings, will share their insights and discuss best practices. This portion of the day-long forum is open to all faculty and will use NC State’s Plant Sciences Initiative and Purdue’s Discovery Park as case studies for the discussion. Vice Chancellor Alan Rebar will facilitate the discussions and the Q&A. Lunch will be provided, and the session will be livestreamed. More details to come.
  • NC State’s Research Leadership Academy will host a junior faculty forum — Enhancing Success in Navigating the Path to Tenure — on Wednesday, October 10 from noon-1 p.m. in the Talley Student Union Ballroom. Faculty will have the opportunity to question a panel of senior faculty and university leaders about concerns and challenges as junior faculty in today’s research environment. Register today and contact Laura Kroeger at lakroege@ncsu.edu with any questions.

From the Office of Faculty Development:

  • The Office of Faculty Development has partnered with NCSU Libraries to offer Faculty Writing Retreats each month for tenure and non-tenure track faculty. Locations will rotate between two Faculty Research Commons spaces in both D.H. Hill Library (Main Campus) and James B. Hunt Jr. Library (Centennial Campus). During Fall and Spring Breaks, the Faculty Writing Retreat will last two days. Brief workshops (15-25 minutes) on relevant topics will be led by NCSU Libraries staff. Sign up for one or both days during Fall and Spring Break. Space will be limited for each monthly retreat, so please sign up early if interested at go.ncsu.edu/ofd-writingretreat. The next retreat will be held October 4-5.
  • Amy Neaves has joined the Office of Faculty Development as senior faculty development specialist.

From NC State DELTA:

  • Register now for DELTA’s fall workshops open to faculty, staff and graduate teaching assistants. Topics include: Moodle, Top Hat, Gmail and Google Drive; recording and delivering instructional video; and creating interactive content in Moodle with H5P.
  • DELTA has announced $240,000 in new and continuing DELTA Grants to 29 projects submitted by faculty and staff representing eight academic colleges and the Division of Academic and Student Affairs. The grants are part of DELTA’s innovative efforts to create solutions to instructional challenges by promoting the use of instructional technology and course design. This year’s grants are being awarded in six categories: faculty fellows, blended learning, critical path course redesign, online and distance education, exploratory, and rapid design.

From the Office of Assessment:

  • Each year, every academic program offering a degree or certificate is evaluated by its faculty to improve the program’s effectiveness. We’ll periodically highlight examples of what a selected program has done to become even stronger. In 2018, the History – bachelor’s degree program assessed students’ ability to “demonstrate historical expression by being able to produce written forms of communication appropriate to the discipline of history.” To measure this outcome, the history faculty used a common rubric to analyze senior seminar capstone research papers. As a result of their analysis, the program took the following actions for improvement: the History Curriculum Committee shared the rubric used to analyze the outcome to guide students’ historical writing, to articulate shared standards; and asked faculty teaching senior seminars to incorporate a process of revisions for abstract, introduction, and conclusion sections to promote precision of claims and conclusions in research papers.

Please take note of the nomination deadlines for the following faculty awards:

 

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