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Western New Mexico University has created a new, prestigious award to recognize the staff member who best represents remarkable achievement, unwavering dedication and leadership, and a commitment to excellence. This Presidential Leadership Award will be given annually, and recipients will receive their awards at the Welcome Back Convocation in January. The impetus for the award came from a desire to create an award for staff that parallels the prestigious awards given to faculty each year, said Staff Senate President Adele Springer. While the university already has awards for Employee of the Month and Employee of the Year, these awards are not available to employees who are currently part of a bargaining unit. The new award will be open to any employee of WNMU with at least three years of service who works in a regular, benefits-eligible position, except faculty and senior leadership. The Presidential Leadership Award is intended to not only honor individual achievements but also...

 It is not every day that a professional film crew makes its way to Silver City. This fall, though, Western New Mexico University will be in front of the lens on the TV series “The College Tour.” The first college or university in New Mexico to be on the show, WNMU will be the sole focus of the half-hour episode, scheduled to be available for streaming next spring. Now in its 10th season, “The College Tour” is a TV series created by Emmy-nominated and multi-award-winning producers. The series tells the story of colleges and universities across the country. Each episode of “The College Tour” focuses on a single college or university. Hosted by Alex Boylan, who won CBS’s “Amazing Race” at age 23 and has gone on to have a highly successful career both in front of and behind the camera, the show features college students telling their own stories. The series can be watched on Amazon Prime and other streaming services. “The idea for ‘The College Tour’ came to...

The recent proliferation of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies poses many questions about the appropriate use of AI in academic environments. At WNMU those questions have prompted the formation of the AI Work Group, which includes faculty, staff, and students and began meeting in the Spring of 2023. WNMU Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs Jack Crocker formed the AI Work Group after hearing a presentation by WNMU Professor of Biology Manda Jost at the spring semester Welcome Back Convocation. Jost explained that the timing of her presentation was because spring “was the first semester we had to really seriously start thinking about students using AI, both from the point of view of a tool that helps them and as something that might compromise their learning.” Jost is committed to considering AI in its full complexity—not just as a dangerous temptation to cheat but also as a potentially useful resource. “AI are very powerful tools,” she said,...

Four WNMU students—Soozy Wollard, Itzela Darkenwald, Devin Larsen (BS ’23) and Abel Lazzell—led teams of high school students on outdoor expeditions in the northeastern United States this summer. The opportunity was organized by WNMU Outdoor Program Manager Will Tracy in a partnership with the Oliverian School, a private, alternative boarding school in the White Mountains of northern New Hampshire. The expeditions were part of a series of three, two-week long learning modules with both experiential and academic components. Students in the program went hiking in the White Mountains, caving in New York and Vermont and paddling in northern Maine. As an example of how the experiential and academic components fused, Tracy said that in the caving module, students learned about geology and then were in “this amazing, novel environment that they would never be in—caving—and that . . . crystallized the learning from the classroom.” The WNMU students on the expeditions were...

“In order for to be successful,” said Elizabet Woche, “we have to set them up to be successful.” Woche started at Western New Mexico University as a recruiter in the Office of Admissions and Recruitment and now also serves as the compliance official for students attending WNMU on student visas. The position has given her insight on what international students need to succeed and she is now implementing her ideas through an orientation program and by advising a new student organization. This year, Woche planned and led the university’s first orientation program dedicated to international students. The need for the orientation became apparent to Woche as she observed the complex processes that international students had to navigate. “Students would come to WNMU and figure out everything by themselves,” said Woche, “Transportation from El Paso or Tucson, classes, laws, immigration, visas—all those responsibilities were on the students.” The complexity of...

Valerie DeLaCruz’s tightly knit ranching family thought that they could fend for themselves. That all changed about two years ago when both of DeLaCruz’s grandfathers approached the end of their lives within a few months of each other. Suddenly, DeLaCruz and her formerly independent family found themselves welcoming hospice workers into their homes. “Hospice was just great to us,” said DeLaCruz, “They were amazing. They helped us mentally, physically. They helped with everything.” It was this experience that made DeLaCruz realize she wanted to be a social worker. “It was seeing that people do make a difference in families,” she explained. The experience made such an impression on her that she wrote an essay about it, “Rock Bottom,” that is soon to be printed in “The Maverick,” published by Mimbres Press of Western New Mexico University. Now in her second year in the WNMU BSW program, DeLaCruz is already making a difference in the world. This year, she was...

Two WNMU master’s degree programs, the Master of Arts in Counseling and the Master of Social Work, have teamed with the New Mexico Expanding Opportunities Project (EOP) to support graduate students who plan to provide mental health care in the state’s school system. Sponsored by the NM Department of Education’s Safe and Healthy Schools Bureau, the EOP “aims to recruit and retain school-based mental health (SBMH) professionals to serve the needs of students across New Mexico, focusing on rural and frontier communities with a high percentage of at-risk and vulnerable student populations,” according to the program’s website. The program is funded with a grant from the United States Department of Education. The EOP funds current graduate students in behavioral health fields as well as SBMH providers that are already licensed. Awardees of the grant are required to commit to working for at least two years in a New Mexico school. While the EOP was originally designed to...

“The longer I have been here, the more and more and more I love it,” says Phoenix native Breya Brown of living in Silver City. Brown, who graduated from WNMU with a degree in Kinesiology in May, is the new Campus Recreation (C-Rec) Coordinator. One of her goals in the role is to help students love living here as well, and she certainly has enough activities planned to keep students happily busy when they are not in class or studying. One of the first items on her agenda when she began the new position was to start an intramural sports program. “Being in charge of the gym and all the intramural sports is something I am really passionate about,” said Brown. So far, the sports in the intramural program include basketball, volleyball, soccer, ultimate Frisbee, and pickleball. “Pickleball is a really popular one right now,” she said, “A lot of the community members come for that one.” Involving the community in C-Rec programs is important to Brown. “I think it is...

“I wanted to concentrate and take my art practice more seriously,” says ceramics artist Susie Meskill about what brought her to Western New Mexico University. Recently, Meskill completed her second year in the ceramics post-baccalaureate program at WNMU, a program that helps aspiring artists develop their practice. The post-baccalaureate program is designed for people in the position Meskill was in when she started: artists who are ready to focus intently on their art practice as they transition from student to professional artist. The program is one that benefits both the individual and the university. The post-baccalaureate student is provided with studio space and mentorship from WNMU faculty, and in return, they work a number of hours each week to manage the ceramics studio, assist with classes, and lead workshops. During their time in the program, artists are able to develop a portfolio of work that can help them in getting into graduate school or pursuing other...