GRAND VALLEY
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AMENDMENT
Fall break proposal moves up for faculty approval BY ANNE MARIE SMIT NEWS@LANTHORN.COM
Last Thursday, Nov. 2, the Grand Valley State University student senate voted in favor of a fall break proposal, which was presented to the University Academic Senate Executive Board Friday, Nov. 3. Jonathan Bowman, president of student senate, is currently in discussion with faculty and administration on the proposed calendar changes. Bowman wants to assure GVSU students that he is serious about making a fall break a reality. “This has been something student senate has been talking about for four or five years,” he said. “Something that I’m really going to push for is some action. It’s been talked about for a long time, but let’s stop talking and start acting.” While student senate and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) sponsor a fall breather for a weekend in October, Bowman said it wasn’t very successful because students were still assigned homework during that period. “Originally, the fall breather is something we talked about when we were encouraging different (GVSU) colleges not to assign homework because we thought that might be easier to accomplish than getting a day off school,” Bowman said. “We found that most students were still getting assigned work, so that wasn’t very effective.” Dan Ziegenfelder, vice president of student senate, pointed out that instituting a fall break on campus is not solely about giving students a break from their schoolwork but is also about giving them more time to finish assignments and assess how the semester is going. “I think it’s a good time to evaluate how things are,” Ziegenfelder said. “The idea of the fall break is to use that time catching up on things, spending that time on assignments. Other universities have something similar to that, and the whole idea is to help students with their grades and mental health.” Ziegenfelder said GVSU looks far ahead when making the calendars. Because of that, many events are already scheduled for next fall, and changing the calendar so suddenly would be disruptive. Plus, it wouldn’t give professors much time to change their curriculum. “I’m for a fall break, but I’m not for implementing it next year when so much groundwork has already been put in for next year,” he said. “I think it’s making students aware that it’s not something that can easily be changed. It’s going to take a little bit of time. SEE PROPOSAL | A2
MAKING AN IMPACT: Katie Gipe receives her diploma during the Grand Valley State University commencement Saturday, April 29. The 11th annual Accountability Report found that GVSU has some of the highest pass rates among public institutions in the state of Michigan in certain fields and majors. GVL | EMILY FRYE
GV releases annual Accountability Report Numbers show high enrollment, retention rates
BY KARINA LLOYD NEWS@LANTHORN.COM
T
he 11th annual Grand Valley State University Accountability Report, released Friday, Nov. 3, at the GVSU Board of Trustees meeting in the Kirkhof Center, revealed a steady rate of strong performance. The purpose of this report is to assess what students are getting out of their education and how successful the university is at delivering its promise of a quality education at GVSU. The results of this report were measured based on the seven core values of GVSU’s 2016-21 strategic plan: excellence, integrity, inquiry, inclusiveness, community, sustainability and innovation. According to the report, GVSU continues to rank exceptionally well in in the areas of retention rate, graduation rate, degrees awarded in critical skills, Pell-eligible students and accessibility by qualified students. For the fourth year in a row, GVSU has enrolled more than 25,000 students, and for the sixth consecutive year, GVSU has seen more than 4,000 freshmen alone join the GVSU community. This year’s enrollment number is 25,049, in comparison to Michigan State University’s 49,042, University of Michigan’s 45,846 and Wayne State University’s 27,089. Even more significant, the fresh-
man-to-sophomore retention rate holds steady at 84 percent, ensuring the likelihood that GVSU’s incoming classes will be Lakers for a lifetime. “What we’ve been able to do over the years is create a place where students want to be, (where) they want to come ... to get their degree and experience a program that’s going to be helpful to them in their future,” said GVSU President Thomas Haas. “And I think we’ve been able to ... create a university students want to be a part of because we’re focusing in on their success.” The university has seen a slight increase in the diversity on campus as a record number of students of color (4,344) joined GVSU’s campus in 2017. “Diversity is an intellectual asset for a university, and when we have individuals that have their own backgrounds and values, we create a much more robust and vibrant learning community,” Haas said. “When we create that type of university, people want to join us (and) students want (to) experience what we have here because we’re providing great value. “I am very, very pleased that we are attracting people from different parts of the state, different parts of the nation and the world, and with those different backgrounds they bring, we (become) a better university.”
GVSU’s strong graduation rate of 66 percent is likely to attract incoming students. GVSU ranked at the fourth highest compared to 15 other public universities in Michigan, 11 of which ranked below 60 percent. The university continues to push for these high graduation rates by providing the Grand Finish Grant, which awards students up to $1,000 for graduating in four years. More than 2,650 students received this grant during the 2016-17 school year. “We have literally thousands of students now (that) have taken advantage of that particular incentive financially now to keep them on track,” Haas said. “I am very, very pleased that we have continued to see the debt load of our students that graduate within four years go down and have about a third of our students have no debt if they graduate within four years. “I am really pleased with the efforts we had to create something that is unique in higher education with that particular (grant).” After graduating from GVSU, students often continue on the path to success, as the pass rate of graduates on licensure and certification exams is 100 percent in a series of demanding fields. These areas of study include finance, nursing (doctoral child/ adolescent nurse practitioner),
physical therapy, police academy, military police basic training program, and speech and language pathology. Other impressive pass rates include occupational therapy (98 percent), physician assistant (98 percent), athletic training (96 percent) and medical laboratory science (94 percent), according to the Accountability Report. These passing scores contribute to the 93 percent of recent graduates who are employed or in graduate school and 86 percent of graduates who are working in Michigan. Despite the performance of GVSU graduates, GVSU has received the second-lowest funding per student from state appropriation for the past five years. Haas said the allocation GVSU receives from the state of Michigan is not adjusted based on performance and is not given on a per-student basis. “We have tried to increase (the funding) for my 11 and half years here,” Haas said. “Past presidents have tried to increase it. What we are faced with fundamentally is the state does not take into account any increases in the number of students that the university is serving. They do not, in Michigan, allocate on a per-student basis.” SEE REPORT | A2
CRIME
GVPD receives multiple reports of car-part thefts BY ARPAN LOBO NEWS@LANTHORN.COM
MISSING PIECE: The space where the catalytic converter is supposed to be on a 2000 Honda Accord. The car owner believes the piece was stolen in between Sunday, Oct. 29, and Monday, Oct. 30, on the Allendale Campus. COURTESY | JESSIE CARLE
The Grand Valley State University Allendale Campus has been hit with a relatively unheard-of set of thefts. Since Monday, Oct. 30, the GVSU Police Department has had eight separate reports of theft of catalytic converters, a car part that sits underneath the car. Catalytic converters are used to convert chemical pollutants produced by the car’s engine into less-harmful exhaust. The reports have all came from the university’s Allendale Campus. Catalytic converters contain precious metals such as platinum, palladium and rhodium, depending on the car model. As many of the models robbed of converters are older models, it is believed that the converters are being sold for scrap metal. GVPD believes that the people stealing the parts are using a reciprocating saw. Due to the location of the car part—underneath the car and generally toward the middle, depending on the model— GVPD believes that the thieves are
using car jacks to remove the part. Brandon DeHaan, acting director of the GVPD, encourages GVSU students and community members to remain vigilant, especially if they see anything that appears suspicious. “We encourage students to call 911 immediately,” DeHaan said. “We want to encourage our community to be good bystanders and practice bystander intervention.” There have been reports of the stolen car parts in the surrounding Allendale area and the greater Grand Rapids area as well. GVPD is collaborating with the Ottawa County Sheriff ’s Office on the investigation. The first report of the incident came Monday, Oct. 30, but it is possible, according to GVPD, that the thefts all occurred on the same night. “I can’t speak with authority about this, but it is possible that they may have all happened at the same time,” DeHaan said. The removal of a catalytic converter is not a quick process, as any potential thief would have to get underneath SEE THEFTS | A2