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ONLINE DEGREES
SMSU to launch 11 fully-online degrees
Southwest Minnesota State University will offer 11 degrees totally online starting in the fall semester 2020. President Kumara Jayasuriya told the SMSU community at an August, 2019 All-University Address that it was a goal to have five online degree programs by fall semester 2020. “I asked for five, and now that number is at 11,” he said. To ensure the full programs can be offered online (0-120 credits), SMSU will offer online options to meet the Minnesota Transfer Curriculum — general education goal areas — for the following 11 undergraduate programs starting in the fall semester 2020: • Sociology • Community Psychology and Health Promotion • Early Childhood Education (MN Licensure Preparation) • Early Childhood, Special Education (MN Licensure Preparation) • Elementary Education (MN Licensure Preparation) • History • Special Education (MN Licensure Preparation) • Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL Licensure Preparation) • Management: Emphasis areas — General Management; Supply Chain Management; Human Resources; Entrepreneurship • Marketing • RN to BSN (Nursing) President Jayasuriya said that in 2019, there were 6.6 million adult college students, or non-traditional learners. Nearly 38 percent of the current undergraduate population is comprised of adult learners, and of those, 58 percent are working, and 25 percent are raising children.
“Many adult learners attend college to either advance in their workplace or to expand their career options. Most of the non-traditional students are unable to attend traditional universities due to the time commitment or distance,” said President Jayasuriya. “With these programs, it will be possible for students who are working full-time to earn a bachelor’s degree without leaving their job.” To learn more about online options, visit: www.SMSU.edu/online; or email OnlineLearning@smsu.edu.
The SMSU Planetarium is Going to Mars with NASA The SMSU Planetarium is going to Mars. The Planetarium — well, the name, anyway — will land on the planet Mars sometime around February 18, 2021. The NASA spacecraft “Mars 2020” will lift off about July 17, 2020. It will include a lander rover, “Perseverance,” that will scout a 30-mile wide ancient dried up lake, called Jezero. Specifically, it will study deposits from a dried up river delta leading into the lake. SMSU Planetarium Director Ken Murphy said he registered with NASA and was approved to have the Planetarium’s name included in the mission. “They etch the name (of the Planetarium) onto a computer chip, and that chip will be on the rover that will be on the surface of Mars. I thought that would be an interesting way to connect SMSU to this exciting new mission to another planet,” he said. “The crater where it lands is an ancient lake. The water is gone, and it will set down right on a river delta that fed into the lake. Those are valuable places to study, because it can pick up samples from the vicinity and will do chemical analyses and get a sense of what’s all there. It has sensors on board that will collect data and relay back to Earth,” he said. The mission, according to the NASA website, will last for one Mars year, or 687 Earth days. The rover will “cache” its samples in the hopes
that a subsequent mission can retrieve and return them to Earth for more thorough testing in NASA laboratories. The mission also hopes to identify past environments capable of supporting microbial life and seek signs of past microbial life in special rocks known to preserve such signs. “I find it very uniting,” said Murphy. “With the challenges we are facing today, it will offer a new way to learn together and appreciate the engineering and science of this exciting new mission, as it is connected now with SMSU.” Murphy plans on doing Planetarium shows relating to the mission as the landing date nears.
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