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Storm Wrecks Green Springs

by Marshall Miller, Feb 10, 2015

The afternoon of Thursday, February 5th, acustomer at the Greensprings Inn (where I happen to be a server) asked me if wewere ready for “the storm”. My response was, “We are as ready as we can be.”

But who could prepare for what was next? The community ofthe Greensprings became a post-apocalyptic region full of destruction and abandoned of electricity and plumbing for three days.

Friday morning all roads entering the Greensprings including Dead Indian Memorial Road, Highway 66, and Tyler Creek Road were closed off due to landslides and flooding. Residents of the area were unable to make the drive to or from town until around 4pm in the afternoon.

None of this quite sounds like the end of the world, but trust me, when you are unable to shower for 3 days, your plumbing doesn’t work (you may use your imagination), there is no food because your refrigerator let everything spoil, and you can’t charge your phone, it is definitely not a picnic. “It was like living in the dark ages,” states resident Zach Knudsen.

During those dark moments (literally) for the GS community, there was one bright light that kept the community going. Well, sort of, it was several lights, all run by generators and from candles. The Greensprings Inn kept on providing people with food and light all through the weekend.

Thankfully now the roads are clear, the power and plumbing are back, but unfortunately many families will have to wait for roofs and totaled cars to be fixed from the downed trees. 

But as a member of the GS community myself, I can speak for all of us when I say that electricity and plumbing will not be taken for granted for a very long time.

By: Robbie Wilkins

Myself and a team of three other individuals, Jake Coburn, Miranda Duggan, and Devin Shea worked diligently over the period of a term to collect a large amount of information about the ever changing landscape of the facilities on the campus of Southern Oregon University. Many things are changing at SOU and will continue to change to better not only the school community, but the community of Ashland Oregon as a whole. Below is a link to our collective page of information about the building landscape at SOU.

Written by Parker Mills

Southern Oregon University was forced to declare retrenchment this year due to years of state disinvestment, changes in Oregon University System accounting policies, an unexpected drop in fall enrollment and two of the largest graduating classes that SOU has ever seen.

Currently, SOU relies on student tuition for the largest percentage of its revenue, meaning that low enrollment and large graduating classes caused the university to drop below the 5 percent fund balance required by the State Board of Higher Education. The fund balance represents the university’s cash-on-hand in relation to the overall operating budget; the required fund balance is designed to protect public universities from short-term financial crises.

Currently the administration is pursuing furlough days, staff reductions, structural changes, as well as program eliminations to achieve the required 5 percent fund balance by the end of the 2013-15 biennium.

Majors that are being eliminated include physics, art history, and French as well as the elimination of the geography, geology, and German minors. However, for those students currently involved in these majors a two-year teach-out program will be offered. This means that, for those students promised affected majors in their calendar year, program representatives will work with students to create plans in order for those students to graduate with their promised majors. Such plans include classes taught by emeritus professors, and working with community employers; if this system works, then the administration will consider a single option major. While it seems like these program cuts are all over the board, they have been carefully considered with such factors as student want and total graduation rates.

Languages at SOU are being hit especially hard with Spanish as the only remaining language in which a student can earn either a major or a minor. However, due to community outcry, language studies in French, German, International Sign Language, and Japanese will continue with out a major or minor option. The retrenchment plan states that the university will, “support international studies, study abroad, and students wishing to work overseas.”

Another big change at SOU is the amount of university seminar (USEM) classes offered. USEM classes are courses required for all incoming freshmen; these courses teach incoming freshmen how to use library resources, as well as making sure their writing level is that of a college student. The reason the administration is eliminating these classes is due to the introduction of alternatives in general education such as advanced placement classes and freshmen increasingly bringing transfer credits into their first year. The administration believes that this change in general education will allow them to offer fewer traditional first-year courses.

While not all programs are being cut, students will notice significant changes in all programs. These changes are due to the academic restructuring of all remaining departments. An example would be the combination of the Theater and Music departments into the Performing Arts Department. The combination of these departments is predicted to save .95 full-time equivalent in contingent faculty.

SOU Past and Present is a website devoted to showing what lead up to retrenchment and what is happening around the university. 

The website design is based off of the Nina theme created by VILÉM RIES. Under the Creative Commons Licensing I was able to take the base that was created by the person and tweak it. 

Doing it this way, instead of using Tumblr or Word Press. I was able to shake off the rust that had accumulated around my knowledge of HTML codding. Boy was there a lot of rust. 

There is a big generational gap between HTML and HTML 5. Then add some javascript and jQuery, I felt a bit overwhelmed. 

In the end the website that came out, is in my opinion great. If I had more time, I would have added more to the site and polished it a bit more. 

The following pictures are some taken from the site itself. 

The picture above is the background picture. This was taken from a spot on Dead Indian Memorial Road. 

This picture is of Kevin Sahr, taken by Ben Krall for one of his articles on the site.

Come by and check the site out:

Story Written by Tamara Henderson

Despite a two-year commitment to teach out degrees and minors eliminated during Southern Oregon University’s retrenchment process, some students who missed an April 1 deadline for declaring eliminated majors and minors may not be able to complete their intended programs. Reductions in program offerings might also affect SOU’s recruitment and retention efforts.

As a result, the retrenchment plan has left many students uncertain about their academic future. The combined average five year graduation rate in minors slated for elimination is more than 19 (see figure 1). If the five year average graduation holds true, nearly twenty fewer students per year may no longer be able to complete their intended minor due to cuts in the retrenchment plan. 

Figure 1:

Junior Sam Burress is one of the students who has seen cuts to all of her programs. Burress is a Forensics Chemistry major and a photography minor.  

Normally a student applies for a minor as a part of the graduation process. However, Burress declared the Photography minor by the April 1 deadline since the program is being eliminated. This declaration is the only way she will be guaranteed the opportunity to receive the courses needed to complete her intended minor.

Since the deadline of April 1 has passed it remains unknown how many, if any, students working toward a particular major or minor were not aware of the deadline to declare. Since minors don’t typically need to be declared, some students may not realize they may face barriers in obtaining the necessary courses to fulfill a particular minor. Since some underclassmen aren’t meeting with advisors as regularly, it remains untold how many students could be affected.

Aside from the current students affected, future students interested in these programs may not attend SOU now that they have been listed for elimination. Burress said the only reasons for her choosing this school over an Ivy League are now gone with the elimination of both Photography and much of the Forensics program.

A combined total of more than 50 students per year graduated with one of the credentials slated for elimination, which include a combination of majors, minors, certificates, and concentrations. While many of these were targeted for their low student interest, the Forensics concentration within the Criminology and Criminal Justice major has seen more than ten graduates per year.

Figure 2:

SOU is enacting the retrenchment plan because the university fell below the required fund balance. Fund balances, which are a percentage of overall annual budgeted operations revenues, are required to be above five percent. The fund balance represents the university’s cash on hand. Public universities must maintain a fund balance of at least five percent of the institution’s operating budget to ensure it has enough cash on hand to overcome any short-term financial challenges. SOU has fallen below that level and as a result entered into a required retrenchment plan in which reductions to staff and academic program save $7.8 million in one-time savings and $6.1 million in permanent savings.

By: Robert Wilkins

It's a cool Saturday morning in Ashland Oregon as a group of Southern Oregon University students pack up their microcontroller devices. They are headed to Tinkerfest 2014 at Scienceworks Museum to show off their robotic shadow puppets. .

The group of students made up of different majors and grades are under the command of Professor David Bithell who offered this class this spring term. The class is a robotics shadow puppet art class, focusing mainly on the use of microcontrollers in an art environment.  

Each Monday the students would get together, from six o'clock to ten o'clock and collaborate in different groups on their final project. All the projects needed to be read and working for this day, Tinkerfest.

Originally the plan was that there would be two performances. One at the Oregon film festival that would be like a midterm, then at Tinkerfest which would count as the final. Unfortunately most of the projects where not ready to be shown on the night of the Oregon Fringe Festival.

You could feel the anxiety and excitement in the air as the groups begun setting up their projects for tinkerfest. The feeling was one of we made it this far and the projects are ready to go. Most of the students were at the festival from ten thirty in the morning till about two thirty in the afternoon. As the group of students packed up you could see the accomplishment on their faces.

As David Daniels, one of the students who partook in the event put it, “Its like the feeling I got after doing a gig, a one of emptiness and accomplishment.”

I say down with Professor David Bithell two weeks after tinkerfest to talk with him about how it went. And how he thought the students projects went, what he might change next time he teaches the class.

<a href="https://vimeo.com/97465690">Link To Video Interview</a><a href="https://vimeo.com/97465690">Link To Video Interview</a>https://vimeo.com/97465690https://vimeo.com/97465690“I think it turned out to be a positive experience both in terms of having a very project based activity for students so there is a sort of a focal point for throughout the term when working towards a common goal and a goal that reaches out beyond just campus so it engages with the community with a number of different ages and audiences from novice to expert” Professor Bithell replied when asked about how the class went in general. It actually got really pleasant feedback from some of the some coordinators there saying that it really felt in the spirit of the Tinkerfest which is really meant to embrace all range of things things that are flawless and things that have flaws. You know the idea of thinking and tinkering with with your hands is really sort of what they are interested in. So having projects that demonstrate a wide range of levels and also sort of tackling things tackling issues.” he answered when asked about some of the feedback that he got from the Tinkerfest.<aA

In my opinion this was a great experience for the class and myself. I am excited to see what Professor Bithell has in mind for next year’s Tinkerfest. 

(Schaffer in her office, left)

With the financial situation as it is at Southern Oregon University, it may be surprising to know clubs on campus still exist. One of the clubs is the French Club, which holds it’s annual “Le Diner Francais”, or “French Dinner”, every winter. Lauren Schaffer, a French professor at SOU, helps organize the event and attends every year.

“[There’s] huge planning with the French club,” Schaffer said, from figuring out the menu to lining up volunteers from the French classes on campus. “It takes months and months of planning.”

At the event, guests are treated to an elegant setting complete with crisp table cloths, romantic lighting, and a well-mannered waiting staff. The meal is comprised of five courses, which usually include a soup, salad, entrée, fruit and cheese platter, and a decadent dessert – all in French style, of course. For those over twenty-one, wine is available while everyone else gets cider.

“It sells out every year,” Schaffer said about the popularity of the event, and that’s not limited to just students and faculty. “There are lots of families that come. I mean, it’s a five-course meal for seven dollars. There’s always a big variety of people from the community,” Schaffer said.

The event will come again for winter 2014 and promises to be just as fun as the years past.

The French Club is a very active club on campus, also holding a movie night where a French film is screened and popcorn, cookies, and beverages are served. The club meets once a week and its goal is to promote French language and culture on campus, according to the club’s SOU page.