They're back...We kicked the week off on Monday with make-up orientation and a part-time job fair.

Tuesday was Student Convocation day with a variety of orientation sessions for new students...The Dental Hygiene Students grilled burgers in the front yard and then handed out floss for all who needed it.

Tuesday through Friday was filled with people searching for parking spaces believe it or not.  Even though we built the new West lot, we had over 100 students parking on the streets and in CiCo Park's upper lot.  Perhaps it is because our first day headcount was 766 as compared to the same day last Fall where 664 started the year.

Does anyone remember the old Five Man Electric Band song Signs?  ♪ ♫ Signs, signs everywhere a sign, do this don't do that...♫ ♪   Well, with new parking lots and changing other parking lot layouts come more signs.  Here's a picture of Dave and a couple of Electric Power students pushing one of many new sign posts into the rock hard Earth earlier in the week.  Pretty ingenious, don't you think?

As a part of the week's activites we had student and employee safety training with our friend Guy Blazing, a Money Management Seminar, Big Poppi Bike Expo, Hitting the MATC Trail for exercise and prizes, and a Yoga class to relax before going home. 

Friday afternoon we have an apparel sale, student panel and ice cream social, scavenger hunt and we will top it all off with a BBQ and concert on the front lawn featuring The Randel Stueve Band.  Phew...TGIF.

This past Monday Marilyn Mahan and Barb Wenger appeared on Channel 13 WIBW talking about our AALT (Advanced Applied Laboratory Technology) program and MLT (Medical Lab Technology).  Click on this link:  http://wibw.videogenesis.net/watch?v=16297

Our new Instructional Technologist, Trina, has helped our faculty and staff develop intro clips to use in class, on our Facebook page, and other places.   Here is one example:  Click on the center of the box below and turn on your sound.

This will be the last week in the library for the Youth Honors Academy art display, presented by the Manhattan Art Center.  Fifteen displays are represented among selected 2^nd - 12^th grade students from Manhattan and the surrounding areas.  Following this display in September, we will have a display from the Kansas State Historical Society: Kansas Tornado.

Have a great weekend and maybe we'll see you at the BBQ/Concert tonight.

Rob

Congratulations to our Information and Network Technology program for being selected as a Center of Excellence by the Kansas Board of Regents. With this designation comes an award of $50,000 to be used to continue enhancing the program and allows the College to explore more “cutting edge” initiatives. Two factors that contributed to this recognition come from the program’s Capstone Project which the graduating sophomores put together as a team and demonstrate each Spring and, to the Cyber Security Certification training which MATC is officially the lead institution of the Kansas Cyber Security Education Consortium. The other two “Excellence in Technical Education Program Award” winners for 2011 are: Physical Therapist Assistant-Kansas City Kansas Community College and Wind Energy Technology-Cloud County Community College. The Board of Regents received a total of 15 applications with 8 community colleges submitting 11 applications and 3 technical colleges submitting 4 applications.

The first week with faculty back is winding down and it's wonderful to see how our family has grown and what a great group of professionals we have on board. It really has been a busy summer with probably too many projects going on for anyone to take a breath but all of this is well worth the effort.

This coming week is designated as Welcome Week. Our Student Services folks have created a whole new group of activities and orientation opportunities for both returning students and new students. All of these culminate with a concert on the lawn Friday evening featuring the Randel Stueve Band sponsored by The Library @ MATC. Here is just a glimpse: (Click on the picture to make it larger and easier to read.)

We would like to welcome our newest Faculty members to the MATC family. Front row L to R: Derek Payne, Information & Network Technology; Dr. Michael Wangsgaard, DDS; Dental Hygiene, and Dr. Xiaoxuan "Cherry" Leaym; Chemistry and Anatomy & Physiology Adjunct. Second row L to R: Cheryl Seitz; Dental Hygiene, Marcey Fickbohm; Medical Lab Technology Program Coordinator, and Frank Avila; HVAC.

Linn Schroll and I traveled to Kansas City KS last week to look at three mini-vans that were made available to us for the Recycled Rides (RR) Program. The program has been in place for a number of years where repair shops would receive vehicles and have the parts donated for their repair by local vendors. These vehicles are then donated to a worthy family selected by the RR Board. Linn had approached the organization and suggested that technical colleges should become involved and we have been selected as one of the first in the Country to participate. We chose a 2004 Honda Odyssey with 66,000 miles in great condition other than some body damage. We are going to encourage the RR folks to choose someone from the Wounded Warrior Program as the recipient and will ensure the ceremony is a media event to allow these two worthy programs to be lifted up as they should be.

I was joined by several other tech college presidents in Pittsburg KS last week to meet with the Chair of the Board of Regents, Ed McKechnie and Vice-Chair, Tim Emert prior to their retreat in August. We enjoyed a candid discussion regarding the Board’s relationship with our institutions, our expectations for the future, our concerns, and to lay other important ground work. The meeting was an excellent exchange of ideas and has given us a promising view of the coming year’s activities.

We were visited today by the Director of the Afghanistan Technical Vocational Institute, Ehsanullah Ehsan (center), who was accompanied by Malalai Zalmai (second from the right), Aneil Zalmai (second from left) and Craig Beardsley (right) who is the Program Administrator at the Biological Research Institute here in Manhattan. KSU has a program that trains the Kansas National Guard's Agri-Business Development Teams (ADT) prior to their deployment to Afghanistan. As a result of the relationship that the current ADT has with the professor he will be visiting Manhattan on Aug 4. After an extended conversation he visited several programs in our facilities that align themselves with some of his programs.

Faculty return on August 8th followed on August 16th by students attending Freshmen Orientation. Classes begin for our 8th academic year as an independent college and for our 46th year overall. Perhaps it is time to start planning our semi-centennial celebration.


Check out the display window across from the Library. Nicole and Karen filled 'er up with spirit wear and MATC logo items for freshmen orientation and the beginning of the school year.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Rob