SOU transitions to schools rather than divisions

SOU shifts to four academic “schools”

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(Ashland, Ore.) — Southern Oregon University’s 46 undergraduate and 10 graduate-level academic programs will be distributed among four “schools” rather than the university’s seven current “divisions” when the 2023-24 academic year begins in September.

The organizational shift will eventually eliminate the cost of three director-level positions and will build greater efficiency into SOU’s administrative structure. It is a cornerstone of the cost management plan adopted this spring by the SOU Board of Trustees.

“This move is resourceful and economical, and it also allows us to encourage synergy among academic programs that are related or share common themes,” said Susan Walsh, SOU’s provost and vice president for academic affairs. “We were very intentional in how we grouped the academic programs for each school, evaluating both current qualities and how we expect each program to grow and evolve.”

An example of that strategic placement of programs is in SOU’s new School of Arts & Communication, where the university’s Theatre, Music and Emerging Media & Digital Arts programs will be joined by its Communication, Media and Cinema department, among other programs. All share components related to performance and production, and placing them under the same school will open avenues of potential collaboration.

The four new academic sections at SOU will be the School of Arts & Communication; the School of Science & Business; the School of Education, Leadership, Health & Humanities; and the School of Social Sciences. Two administrative sections with academic functions – the Provost’s Office and the University Library & Undergraduate Studies – will operate as stand-alone departments.

Current academic divisions at SOU are the Oregon Center for the Arts at SOU; Business, Communication & the Environment; Education, Health & Leadership; Humanities & Culture; Social Sciences; Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics; and Undergraduate Studies.

School of Arts & Communication
The SOU School of Arts & Communication will encompass 11 undergraduate programs and one graduate-level program. The undergrad programs are Art and Art History, Communication, Creative Writing, Digital Cinema, Digital Cinema Production Arts, Emerging Media and Digital Arts, Media Innovation, Music, Music Industry & Production Studies, Shakespeare Studies (offered only as a minor) and Theatre. The school’s graduate-level offering is for the Master of Theatre Studies in Production and Design degree.

David Humphrey, currently director of the Oregon Center for the Arts at SOU, has announced that he will retire at the end of December but will serve as the initial director of the new School of Arts & Communication. The search for a new director of the school is underway, and expected to be completed by early fall.

School of Science & Business
The SOU School of Science & Business will be made up of 14 undergraduate programs and two graduate-level programs. The undergrad programs are Biology, Business Administration, Chemistry, Computer Science, Environmental Science & Policy, eSports Management (offered only as a minor), Financial Mathematics, Innovation & Leadership, Management, Mathematics, Mathematics-Computer Science, Sustainability, Sustainable Tourism Management and Preprofessional Programs in medical fields. The school’s two graduate-level programs are for Master in Management and Master of Business Administration degrees.

Vincent Smith – currently director of the Business, Communication & the Environment Division – will serve as director for the new School of Science & Business beginning Sept. 1. Sherry Ettlich – currently director of the Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics Division – will serve in a support capacity until the end of the calendar year, when she plans to retire.

School of Education, Leadership, Health & Humanities
The SOU School of Education, Leadership, Health & Humanities will include eight undergraduate programs and six graduate programs. The undergrad programs are Early Childhood Development, Education Studies, English, Health & Exercise Science, Outdoor Adventure Leadership, Philosophy (offered only as a minor), Spanish Language & Culture and English for Speakers of Other Languages. The graduate programs are Master of Arts in Spanish Language Teaching, Master of Arts in Teaching, Master of Arts in Teaching with Special Education Endorsement, Master of Arts/Science in Education, Master of Outdoor Adventure & Expedition Leadership and the Principal Administrator and Professional Administrator licenses.

Vance Durrington, currently director of the Education, Health & Leadership Division, will serve as director of the new School of Education, Leadership, Health & Humanities.

School of Social Sciences
The SOU School of Social Sciences will have 13 undergraduate programs and one graduate program. The undergraduate offerings are Criminology & Criminal Justice; Economics, Ethnic & Racial Studies (offered only as a minor); Gender, Sexuality & Women’s Studies; Healthcare Administration; History; Human Service; International Studies; Native American Studies (offered only as a minor); Power & Politics; Psychology; Social Justice (offered only as a minor); and Sociology & Anthropology. The graduate program is for the Master in Clinical Mental Health Counseling degree.

Dustin Walcher, currently director of the Social Sciences Division, will serve as director of the new School of Social Sciences.

One other current division director – Lee Ayers, who heads the Undergraduate Studies Division – is also retiring at the end of December. Ayers and Carrie Forbes will co-direct the University Library & Undergraduate Studies department until Ayers’ retirement. Forbes will then continue as director.

The first element of the four-plank SOU Forward realignment strategy was to resolve structural defects in SOU’s financial base and eliminate what was projected as a $14.6 million deficit by the 2026-27 fiscal year. That job is in progress, after the SOU Board of Trustees approved the cost-management portion of the plan in April, reducing expenses by $3.6 million this year and identifying another $9 million in recurring cost reductions. About 82 full-time positions are being cut through a combination of job vacancies, retirements, voluntary departures, non-renewable contracts and elimination of 24 currently-held positions.

SOU is now moving on to the plan’s three other planks, all of which will prepare the university for strategic growth by diversifying its sources of revenue. SOU will reimagine how it supports faculty and programs seeking funding from external granting agencies and organizations, leverage an ongoing surge in philanthropic support and diversify revenue by pursuing entrepreneurial opportunities – including solar power generation and creation of a senior living facility.

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Early learning consortium receives grant

SOU and early learning consortium awarded $1.75 million grant

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(Ashland, Ore.) — The Early Childhood Development program at Southern Oregon University will receive a $1.75 million grant from the Oregon Department of Education’s Early Learning Division to lead and expand a collaborative effort to provide education and support for early-learning professionals in the region.

SOU will become the fiscal agent and lead institution for the Southern Oregon Early Learning Professional Development Consortium – a collaboration between SOU, Rogue Community College, Klamath Community College, Umpqua Community College, Southwestern Oregon Community College and several child-care resource and referral agencies in southern Oregon.

This year’s grant – the largest in the consortium’s nine-year history – will support efforts to provide comprehensive financial and academic assistance to early learning professionals throughout the region. The consortium’s offerings include zero-cost courses, mentorship opportunities and financial assistance.

RCC has served as the fiscal agent and coordinated projects on behalf of the consortium over the past several years, but agreed to pass the leadership role to SOU’s Early Childhood Development team, beginning with the 2023-25 biennium that starts July 1.

“We are dearly and deeply grateful to Eileen Micke-Johnson of RCC, whose unwavering dedication and high-quality leadership has helped this project flourish, year-after-year,” said Younghee Kim, an Education professor at SOU and coordinator of the university’s Early Childhood Development program. “We hope to follow in her footsteps and look forward to consulting with her, in her continuing roles at RCC and beyond.”

Kim will share consortium leadership duties with Kayla Rapet, an instructor, advisor and navigation coach for SOU’s School of Education.

The new round of grant funding will enable the Southern Oregon Early Learning Professional Development Consortium to expand its services and create new and innovative professional development opportunities. New projects that SOU’s ECD team will work to initiate include:

  • Scholarships and other financial assistance for early learning students
  • Micro-credentials in Infant Mental Health and Early Childhood Education, created in partnership with community agencies
  • Hiring a bilingual (Spanish/English) navigation coach for ECD online students who are first-language Spanish speakers
  • A potential Bachelor of Applied Science degree in early childhood education that streamlines pathways for transfer students and aligns with SOU’s newly designed general education courses

The grant is also expected to support peer-mentoring professional development workshops for ECD students, continuation of the ECD Student Leadership Club and expansion of ECD Saturday workshops to advance regional collaborations.

Students in SOU’s ECD program graduate with a solid knowledge base of child development, play-based curriculum and teaching, and best practices for working with young children and their families. They also learn advocacy skills to support the children and families they serve, and the profession of early childhood education.

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first-generation student goes beyond expectations

Southern Exposure published biweekly for summer

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Southern Exposure, Southern Oregon University’s curated e-newsletter, will switch to an every-other week publication schedule for the rest of the summer, following today’s issue. Its next installment will be published on Tuesday, July 11.

Southern Exposure has been delivered by email to all SOU students and employees on Tuesdays since February 2021. It offers a mix of featured stories and reader-submitted announcements with each issue, along with links to the latest mentions of SOU in media outlets nationwide and to the university’s events calendar.

The publication’s featured stories are primarily from SOU News, the website that serves as a source of timely news and information about the university, its programs and its people. Other featured stories are curated from a variety of SOU websites and publications – from departmental blogs to alumni news to Jefferson Public Radio and the Siskiyou student newspaper.

Those who wish to suggest a featured story for SOU News can do so by reading and filling out the online submission form. Submissions for the announcements section of Southern Exposure can be made on a separate form up until noon on the Monday before the next issue is published.

Southern Exposure will resume its regular, weekly publication schedule in September.

A study of gender-affirming care is co-authored by SOU's Travis Campbell

SOU economist co-authors study on gender-affirming care, reduced suicide risk

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(Ashland, Ore.) — Travis Campbell, an assistant professor of economics at Southern Oregon University, is the lead author of a collaborative research paper that suggests providing gender-affirming care to transgender youth reduces their risk for suicide attempts.

The paper, “Hormone Therapy, Suicidal Risk and Transgender Youth in the United States,” was published in the most recent edition of the American Economic Association’s Papers and Proceedings. It found that hormone replacement therapy appears to result in a 14.4 percent decrease in the likelihood of those transgender youth ever attempting suicide.

“By comparing transgender youth who begin hormone therapy to those who begin one year later, our research provides evidence of hormone therapy meaningfully improving the mental health of the recipients,” Campbell said. “This insight suggests that legislation restricting access to gender-affirming care may have large, negative impacts on the lives of transgender youth.”

The study comes as many states have tightened restrictions on gender-affirming care for transgender youth. Bans on such care for minors have been enacted in 20 states – most of them this year – and similar legislation is pending in at least eight others.

In their study, Campbell and co-authors Samuel Mann of Vanderbilt University, Duc Hien Nguyen of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and Yana Rodgers of Rutgers University analyzed data from the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey – the largest-ever assessment of transgender people. More than 27,700 respondents across the U.S. participated in the survey.

Survey data indicated that gender-affirming care reduces what is known as “gender dysphoria” – a sense of distress among some who feel their assigned sex at birth does not match their gender identity. Reducing gender dysphoria, in turn, decreased suicide risk – particularly among those for whom therapy is initiated at ages 14 or 15.

The research found no statistically significant relationship between gender-affirming care and suicide risk among transgender adults – potentially because some transgender youth who are the most at-risk have already attempted suicide, the study’s authors have suggested.

Campbell and Rodgers published a separate study this year – “Conversion therapy, suicidality and running away: An analysis of transgender youth in the U.S.” – in the Journal of Health Economics. That study, which is also based on data from the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey, found that the controversial practice of “conversion therapy” increases the risk of suicide attempts among transgender youth by 55 percent, and increases the likelihood of running away from home by 128 percent. Conversion therapy is the practice of trying to change a person’s sexual orientation – or gender identity or expression – to conform with heterosexual norms.

Campbell joined the SOU Economics faculty after earning his Ph.D. in economics last year from the University of Massachusetts. His research applies microeconomics to social justice issues, including economic inequalities based on race, gender and sexuality. His classes at SOU include Micro and Macroeconomics, Quantitative Methods and Application, Healthcare Economics, Labor Economics and Gender Issues in Economics.

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President Rick Bailey at SOU Commencement Ceremony

SOU’s 97th Commencement Ceremony

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(Ashland, Ore.) — More than 1,300 degrees were conferred when Southern Oregon University celebrated its 97th Commencement Ceremony at Raider Stadium on Saturday, June 17. The ceremony was also livestreamed on Rogue Valley Community Television.

This year’s SOU Commencement featured three student speakers – graduating seniors Morgan Ulu of American Samoa, Aiki Deguchi of Japan and Blake Jordan, who came to SOU by way of Clovis Community College in California, Minneapolis Community and Technical College, and Fresno City College. Each spoke about the insights they have gained during their academic journeys.

SOU President Rick Bailey addressed this year’s graduates and the Commencement audience, and Susan Walsh, the university’s provost and vice president for academic affairs, presided over the ceremony. Recipients of SOU’s 2023 student and faculty awards, and retiring faculty members, were also recognized before graduates were introduced one at a time to receive their diploma covers from President Bailey.

A new SOU tradition – the 2nd annual Commencement Street Fair – was held following the ceremony, south of the stadium near the Lithia Motors Pavilion. It featured global cuisine stations and a beer garden for those over 21.

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Alison Burke presents to United Nations conference

SOU criminology professor presents at United Nations session

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(Ashland, Ore.) — Southern Oregon University criminology and criminal justice professor Alison Burke attended a United Nations conference in Vienna, Austria, last month to present her research on restorative justice to an international panel on crime prevention and criminal justice.

Burke was invited to the 32nd session of the U.N. Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice – one of two policymaking bodies within the U.N. that guide international action on drugs and crime. Resolutions and decisions developed by countries’ delegates provide guidance on crime and justice issues to United Nations member states and to the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime.

Burke and two other criminal justice academics from the U.S. – Stephanie Mizrahi, Ph.D., of California State University-Sacramento, and Angela Henderson, Ph.D., of the University of Northern Colorado – were invited to the U.N. session by Phillip Reichel, Ph.D., a representative of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, an American organization. Their presentations were made to a side panel organized by the ACJS.

The three U.S. criminologists discussed “Amplifying Victims’ Voices to Enhance the Functioning of the Criminal Justice System,” and Burke’s particular presentation was “Harmed People Harm People: Seeing the Offender as the Victim Through a Restorative Lens.”

The three were also invited to participate in other commission sessions as observers.

Burke, who has been an SOU faculty member for 15 years, served in a variety of juvenile justice positions before earning her doctorate from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 2008 and shifting her career to higher education. Her research interests include gender and juvenile justice, and delinquency prevention.

She created and teaches the classes for a Certificate in Restorative Justice at SOU, and also serves as a community restorative justice facilitator for the Emerging Adult Program in Deschutes County.

“I was able to apply outcome data from their EAP program to my (United Nations) presentation on incorporating restorative justice practices and show how restorative justice programs can be immensely effective and applicable worldwide,” Burke said.

“And thanks to students who are interested in learning more about alternatives to incarceration and reframing the punitive nature of the current criminal justice system, I get to teach restorative justice classes full of robust conversations, insightful and inclusive discussions, and true community building within the classroom setting.”

Burke was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to lecture and teach a course on women and crime in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2019.

She earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of New Mexico and her master’s degree in criminal justice from the University of Colorado at Denver. She has also studied at England’s Oxford University.

Her work has appeared in publications including the International Journal of Gender and Women’s Studies, the Journal of Active Learning in Higher Education and the International Journal of Law and Psychiatry. She has authored the books “Gender and Justice: An Examination of Policy and Practice Regarding Judicial Waiver,” published in 2009 by VDM Publishing; and “Teaching Introduction to Criminology,” published published in 2019 by Cognella Press.

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Faculty Spotlight: Erica Knotts

Faculty Spotlight Podcast: SOU’s Erica Knotts

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Off-season strawberries in Oregon likely came from Baja California

From SOU’s HON 319: The Reality of Strawberries from Mexico

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Imagine: Late last night you and your son arrived in Los Reyes, Michoacán, Mexico – Mexico’s top strawberry producer. You stayed with your cousin who lives in Los Reyes. He let you sleep in the living room, tomorrow you’ll have to find somewhere else to stay. You pretended to sleep so your son could do the same. Now it’s four in the morning, and time to go to work. Your cousin says there is work on a farm outside of town. Strawberries. You’ll pick for 10 hours with no break, for 11 pesos an hour. Your son, who is only 14, isn’t legally old enough to work on a farm, but as long as you don’t say anything, they won’t ask any questions. Together, you’ll make 220 pesos for the day. That’s $12.66 USD. That will be just enough to pay for a night in a cramped room, some rice and beans for dinner, and a little bit of money to send home to your family. Then tomorrow you’ll start it all over again. This is the life of the Mexican workers that picked your strawberries. This is the life of so many farmers in Mexico. How does that make you feel?

In Southern Oregon University’s class HON 319: Nature, Culture, Mexico, we dived into research articles about water quality, access to water, and the effects of agricultural practices on water availability throughout Mexico. In one such text, “Water Flowing North of the Border,” author Christian Zlolinski explores how agricultural production has led to the scarcity of water for Baja California locals. According to his findings, high quantities of water are exported to the United States and Canada inside fresh produce (Zloniski, 2011). This offers the convenience of fresh fruit and produce to other countries in exchange for water insecurity in rural Mexico. These communities have very little access to fresh, clean water because it is preferentially diverted to agricultural production. The Mexican government is influenced by big farming corporations to give institutionalized farmers better access to fresh water and restrict access for smaller, local growers, and domestic consumers (Zlolniski, 2011).

In addition to deliberately restricted water access, locals in Baja California encounter further difficulties as they face environmental degradation caused by the overconsumption of water by agribusinesses. Baja California is an arid region with around 7.8 inches (200 mm) of annual rainfall. Due to the low rainfall, there isn’t enough water to recharge depleting aquifers. Out of the 48 aquifers identified in the state of Baja California, 15 no longer have any available water and many others are so depleted that only brackish water can be extracted from them (Cortés-Ruiz et al., 2020; Daesslé et al., 2008). This makes water more expensive to clean, leading to increases in the cost of tap water. This overexploitation has caused a drop in the water table, causing desertification in the region as flora disappears from the landscape. Efforts to re-stabilize the water table have been made in order to bring back water security to the region. However, funding is limited and estimates have shown that it would cost $82 million USD in addition to much of the state’s cropland for Baja California’s water scarcity issues to be solved (Cortés-Ruiz et al., 2020).

Strawberries seem to be the source of a lot of grief for many Mexican citizens, and it’s also not doing any favors for the environment. So why is this still such a serious problem despite the obvious issues for it? Mexico makes up 14.83% of the entire world’s strawberry production, with 35% of Mexico’s strawberries being grown in Baja California. Because Mexico makes up more than 10% of the global strawberry production, it is a certifiably successful industry (Cossio & Flores, 2021; Wu et al., 2018). Mexico’s GDP and economy look incredible on paper because of the money they make off of export agriculture, specifically water-heavy horticulture (Cossio & Flores, 2021). Thanks to this extreme success, this business model makes the country lots of money and provides jobs for the rural population. The clear catch, however, is the sheer amount of water that goes into these crops. An estimated 76% of all water extracted goes to agriculture (Beta Aqueduct). Meanwhile, workers reap close to zero worthwhile benefits and have difficulty accessing clean water. Most of the wages earned from working in agriculture go into paying for basic human needs, the most outrageous being water. In some cases, locals may spend up to two-thirds of their monthly wages on potable water (Zloniski, 2011). So agribusiness in Mexico is a booming industry that supplies many people with jobs that pay livable wages. But those livable wages are just that. Livable. A citizen living in the rural areas of Mexico will spend most of their working life just making enough money to put food on the table until the next paycheck. The real benefits of the Mexican agricultural economy are really only visible in urban areas, such as Mexico City, and various tourist destinations around the country.

So far you have seen abysmal living conditions of Mexican farmers, caused by the agricultural practices in Mexico. The impacts this has had on farmers and the environment are atrocious. Once beautiful, lush landscapes are now dry and desolate because of the water shortage, and produce for export is given preferential access to water over people who lack fresh running water. All of this is possible because there is a market for cheap produce year-round. If there isn’t a market for it, then strawberries and other crops that are grown out of your local season will stop being produced. To make that a reality, consumers need to make the change. Instead of buying strawberries, tomatoes, and cucumbers from Mexico, buy them locally. Supermarket packaging doesn’t always say where produce is coming from, but farmers’ markets are always local. Not only are you not contributing to water shortages in rural Mexico, but you’re supporting local farmers and lowering fossil fuel usage in transporting crops. To top it off, locally sourced, organic produce tastes better and is better for you. As the summer continues and produce comes into season, spend your weekends wandering the aisles of a farmers’ market instead of a supermarket. Your local farmers will thank you.

Authors: Liam Jones, Sierra Garrett, Caleb Zinn, Dylan Hurlimann

Sources:

Beta Aqueduct. “Aqueduct Country Ranking.” n.d. https://www.wri.org/applications/aqueduct/country-rankings/?country=MEX&indicator=bws. Accessed: 06/12/2023

Cortés-Ruiz, A., & Azuz-Adeath, I. (2020). Estimating the future hydric needs of Baja California, Mexico. assessment of scenarios to stop being a region with water scarcity. Water Supply, 21(6), 2760–2771. https://doi.org/10.2166/ws.2020.198

Cossio, A. J. A., Flores, A. A. H. (2021, March 15). Competitividad de la Fresa mexicana en el Mercado Estadounidense de 1992 a 2017. Ciencia y Tecnología Agropecuaria. https://revistacta.agrosavia.co/index.php/revista/article/view/1414

Daesslé, L. W., Ruiz-Montoya, L., Tobschall, H. J., Chandrajith, R., Camacho-Ibar, V. F., Mendoza-Espinosa, L. G., Quintanilla-Montoya, A. L., & Lugo-Ibarra, K. C. (2008). Fluoride, nitrate and water hardness in groundwater supplied to the rural communities of Ensenada County, Baja California, Mexico. Environmental Geology, 58(2), 419–429. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-008-1512-9

Wu, F., Guan, Z., Garcia-Nazareiga, M., & Arana-Coronado, J. (2018). An overview of Strawberry Production in Mexico. University of Florida.  https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/FE1014

Zlolniski, C. (2011). Water flowing north of the border: Export Agriculture and Water Politics in a rural community in Baja California. Cultural Anthropology, 26(4), 565–588. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-1360.2011.01112.x

New solar arrays to be installed at SOU

SOU receives additional $1 million in state support for solar arrays

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(Ashland, Ore.) — Southern Oregon University continues to leverage state and federal support for renewable energy projects, with the Oregon Department of Energy announcing last week that the university will be awarded a $1 million grant for the second straight year to build solar arrays on campus. SOU also received a $2 million congressional appropriation in December to help pay for its bid to become the nation’s first public university to produce all of the daytime electricity used on its campus.

The energy department’s Community Renewable Energy Grant Program awarded a total of $12 million to 39 recipients – Tribes, public bodies and consumer-owned utilities – to support planning and construction of renewable energy or energy resilience projects. SOU’s is one of seven projects that were awarded grants in the neighborhood of $1 million each.

“This grant award speaks volumes about our identity as a public university,” President Rick Bailey said. “This is who we are – fiscally innovative, environmentally sensitive and always mindful of our students and their experiences on our campus.

“This grant and other current and future funding opportunities will allow us to reduce our dependence on tuition as a revenue source, and increase accessibility and affordability for students throughout our state and region.”

The most recent ODE grant will help pay for SOU’s first parking lot solar array, which will consist of solar panels on steel structures in a lot adjacent to The Hawk Dining Commons. The structures will provide shading in addition to power generation, and the project will also pay for eight new electric vehicle charging ports – expanding the university’s total number of EV ports to 20.

Last year’s first-round grant in ODE’s Community Renewable Energy Grant Program – along with federal funding and a contribution from the Student Green Fund – will pay for solar installations on The Hawk Dining Commons and the Lithia Motors Pavilion/Student Recreation Center complex, and a battery storage facility to enhance community resilience. The $2 million congressional allocation will help pay for additional solar arrays on SOU’s parking lots and rooftops.

“Our momentum toward energy independence is very exciting and will be a game-changer for our university,” SOU Sustainability Director Becs Walker said. “We plan to be producing all of our own electricity within about 10 years, and ultimately to become a carbon net zero campus . This progress demonstrates our leadership in sustainability and the transition of the energy infrastructure.

Energy self-sufficiency will save SOU at least $700,000 per year in utility costs and President Bailey plans to expand the program from there, with additional solar installations and partnerships to further build energy and community resilience. He achieved that on a smaller scale at Northern New Mexico College, where he served as president before being hired at SOU in January 2022.

The current solar projects will increase SOU’s generating capacity to about 16 percent of the electricity it uses on campus.

The university has nine solar arrays on its Ashland campus with a total output of 455 kilowatts, plus an array at the Higher Education Center in Medford and a pole-mounted array installed by a nonprofit on land leased from SOU. The two new arrays supported by the state grants will increase SOU’s solar capacity by a total of 359 kilowatts.

SOU will continue to implement energy conservation and energy efficiency measures as it increases its solar power production. SOU’s Hawk Dining Commons and McLoughlin Residence Hall each have solar hot water systems installed to augment their natural gas domestic water heating, and the campus has three net-zero buildings – they create as much or more energy than they use. The university is also a partner in the DOE’s Better Climate Challenge, which supports SOU’s 2033 goals to reduce Scope 1 and Scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent from a 2018 baseline, and to reduce energy intensity by 25 percent from a 2022 baseline.

Solar energy production is a key part of SOU’s plan to develop new, entrepreneurial revenue streams and reduce dependence on the two traditional funding sources for public higher education nationwide – tuition and state funding. The university has also begun a project to demolish the vacant Cascade housing complex and replace it with a senior living facility that produces partnerships between its residents and the university. Funding for the demolition has been approved by the state and is expected to begin in the next several months.

Other projects that will produce revenue or reduce expenses for SOU include the establishment of a University Business District in southeast Ashland – discussions are underway with the local business community – and replacement of its operational software with the cutting-edge Workday platform, which eventually will save the university about $750,000 per year in recurring costs.

ODE’s Community Renewable Energy Grant Program was created by the 2021 Legislature, which set aside $50 million for projects throughout the state over three years – with $12 million available in the current funding cycle. The program is intended to build energy and community resilience in rural, underserved areas, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and help to rewire America through the expansion of solar energy generation and electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

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Fellowship recipients in new NAS-SOULA initiative

SOU programs collaborate to create fellowship opportunity

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(Ashland, Ore.) — Southern Oregon University’s Native American Studies (NAS) program and the SOU Laboratory of Anthropology (SOULA) have created a competitive fellowship that promotes collaboration between the two programs and recognizes the research and learning that spans both.

This year’s inaugural fellowship – which is funded by SOULA – was awarded to SOU undergraduates Kayla Dumore and Charlie Zimmermann, and will support their work with the Shasta Takelma Learning Garden project. The fellowship covers 40 hours per term of a paid internship, which can be shared between two students – as is the case for this year’s inaugural round.

The Learning Garden project aims to turn the space around SOU’s Science Building into a biodiverse and culturally rich learning space, dedicated to celebrating the historical and modern presence of the lands’ original Indigenous occupants and caretakers.

Dumore and Zimmerman are using the fellowship to uncover the historical and archeological stories that lie within the space. The fellows will consolidate the stories and publicly present them prior the eventual construction of the garden.

“I am excited for this fellowship because I get the opportunity to broaden my academic horizons by working with anthropology, and because I get to be a part of a very special project with some great people,” Charlie Zimmerman says.

Charlie is a junior studying history and political science, with a minor in Native American Studies and research interests that include the history of Oregon and westward expansion. Charlie is pursuing a career in public history, copy editing, technical writing or historical society work.

Kayla Dumore is an enrolled Klamath Tribal member, with ties to the Klamath and Modoc peoples. She is working toward a major in Sociology and Anthropology, with a certificate in Native American Studies, and plans to graduate June of 2024. Kayla plans to have a career in research, with a focus on Tribal sovereignty, cross-cultural interactions and the Indigenous history of Oregon. Kayla always keeps her community close at heart in all of the work she does, and is passionate about honoring those of seven generations into the future.

“I am deeply honored to be working on this Indigenous-led project,” Kayla says. “I am passionate about advocating for the inherent sovereignty of Native American peoples and the Indigenization of spaces within higher education. This project does both in a collaborative and meaningful way. I am beyond excited to be working with fellow students, alumni and tribal partners.”

The Native American Studies Program at SOU is an interdisciplinary field that blends social science with humanities. Though Indigenous peoples have always been engaged in theoretical and conceptual activities, the physical presence of NAS as a distinct discipline in academia is an outgrowth of American Indian activism of the 1960s and 1970s.

NAS is a problem-solving, Native American-centered and applied field, which seeks to examine experiences that unify Indigenous peoples in ways that work in service to Native American communities’ contemporary challenges and aspirations. All students are welcome.

The SOU Laboratory of Anthropology connects culture, history and place in a meaningful way. The program conducts grant- and contract-funded research that includes archaeological surveying, excavation and analysis; GIS mapping; and oral history and ethnohistoric research. It serves the interests of the university and community, selecting projects in partnership with private, local, state, federal and Tribal organizations in ways that meet collaborators’ needs and provide data for expanded research and public education.

Students from a wide range of disciplines benefit from SOULA’s hands-on experiences in fieldwork, laboratory analysis, conference presentation, writing and career networking.

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