Bryan Stevenson, whose pioneering work challenging racial discrimination has led to historic changes in the criminal justice system, will be the guest speaker in chapel on Tuesday, March 28, 11:10 a.m. in Brougham Pavilion. He is the author of the critically acclaimed New York Times best-seller Just Mercy and founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative.

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On Sunday, April 2, enjoy an afternoon of vocal and instrumental masterworks from the Renaissance and Baroque eras. This special event celebrates SPU Music Department’s new organ and will feature faculty performances by Les Martin, organ; Brian Chin, trumpet; Chérie Hughes, soprano; Dave Krosschell, sackbut, trombone; Danny Helseth, euphonium; Catherine Haight, soprano; Jan Nelson, alto; and Brad Hawkins, cello. The concert at 4 p.m. in Nickerson Studios.

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The Center for Career and Calling is hosting best-selling author and millennial expert Paul Angone for a special “Life After College” presentation on Thursday, April 6; 3-4:30 p.m. in Demaray Hall 150. He will talk about“How to Thrive After College: Embrace Transition, Fail Magnificently, and Find Your Purpose in the Most Unexpected Place.” He is the author of All Groan Up: Searching for Self, Faith, and a Freaking Job! and 101 Secrets for Your Twenties. Visit the CCC website for more events.

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Welcome to Spring Quarter! As you plan your spring events, be sure to consider whether you want them to appear in the SPU Master Calendar. There are two ways that you can ensure that your event gets on the master calendar:

Via Roomfinder (preferred method)

Manual submission through Master Calendar

The SPU Wiki has step-by-step instructions for both methods. Please review these before submitting your next request in Roomfinder. You might publish an event without realizing it! Conversely, if you don’t choose the appropriate settings, your event could go unnoticed by your intended audience. The documentation explains how to choose the audience that should see your event, or let the system determine it automatically. Once an event is submitted, it is still subject to approval by a calendar manager before being posted.

Faculty and staff are invited to join SPU Switchboard, a new online tool exclusively for the SPU community. You can either "ask" for what you need or "offer" what you have to share, ranging from job and internship opportunities or listings, advice, housing, and more. Sign up online.

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Because Vision Press will be unavailable April 3-12, you have until 9:59 a.m. on Tuesday, March 28, to have stationery order(s) delivered on April 14. Stationery orders are delivered once a month. Orders made after 10 a.m. on March 28 will be delivered May 12. To see deadlines and delivery dates for the remainder of the fiscal year, visit the “Create an Order” stationery page in Banner. For more information, contact Hope McPherson in University Communications at hmcpherson@spu.edu.

The Senior Leadership Team is evaluating the impact of a possible tuition exchange program with Wheaton College (Illinois). They would like to know how many faculty and staff have dependents who may be starting at Wheaton in the fall of 2017. Please send an email to Senior Vice President for Planning and Administration Don Mortenson at dmort@spu.edu if you have dependents starting at Wheaton.  

The Film Studies program is hosting a lecture on Thursday, April 6, 7-8:30 p.m. in Demaray Hall 150. “Film Speak” will feature alumnus Zeek Earl ’11, who co-founded the Seattle-based production company Shep Films with several SPU alumni. The company is producing its first feature film. This lecture is in honor of former SPU art student Richard Sohn, who died in a bus accident during Christmas break in 2011. He was a student of Professor of Art Roger Feldman. Roger says, “I had him as a student during fall quarter and met with him when I heard that his primary interest was to go into film in some capacity. This lecture is in honor of his desire to be involved in this industry, before we had approval for the film studies major.” 

Students and staff in the Center for Professional Education are traveling to Haiti in April. They are collecting school supplies, including pens, pencils, erasers, crayons, notepads, sticky notes, stickers, college-rule paper, stamps, and stamp pads. Items can be dropped off in the donation bin on the second floor lobby of Peterson Hall by Wednesday, April 5.

This summer SPRINT (Seattle Pacific Reachout International) will send four teams of SPU students to learn and serve with local leaders around the world. To support their fundraising, we invite you to hire SPRINT students to help with yardwork, cleaning, or other projects. Your work project helps these students raise funds for their summer immersion learning trips. The recommended rate is $10 per student, per hour. To request a Workshare Request Form or find out more information, email SPRINT Student Fundraising Coordinator Elizabeth Bartholomew at bartholomewe@spu.edu, or John Perkins Center Administrative Assistant Samantha Krecjik at krejciks@spu.edu.

March 27-31: Plan to come to the Falcon’s Landing Fair each day this week. The fair will feature 15 giveaways and food specials like buttered corn, deep-fried Snickers, BBQ chicken wings, corn dogs, funnel cakes, and more.

$5 Friday Specials This Week

Acadmic Perks and Common Grounds: Coconut Macchiato and a granola bar

Cocina del Sol: Tacos and a Dasani bottled water

The Faculty/Staff Bulletin is published weekly during the academic year. If you have information or event news, send it as soon as possible to Bulletin editor Tracy Norlen at fsb-editor@spu.edu. Submissions may be edited for clarity. The next deadline is Thursday, March 30. The next Bulletin will be published Monday, April 3.

Senior Admissions Counselor and alumna Jasmine Hairston ‘15 was nominated and selected as the March Staff Member of the Month. She says the best part of her job is “definitely the students! I absolutely love my students! They are incredible, resilient, and such an inspiration. I have the best conversations with students — conversations filled with heartache, horrible puns, Black Girl Mantras, and empowerment.” Read more about Jasmine, and make sure to submit a nomination for someone you think should be recognized as a future Staff Member of the Month. 

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Assistant Professor of Chinese Xu Bian gave a presentation titled “Spiritual Formation of Chinese Young Adult Protagonists in Literature” at the Christians In English Language Teaching conference, held on March 21 in Seattle.

Associate Professor of Political Science Katya Drozdova authored a research paper titled "Emerging Trends in Cyber Power." The paper included trends in Russia and the United States, as well as global developments. She presented her work at the U.S. National Intelligence Council event on cyber power. 

Assistant Professor of English Peter Moe presented a paper at the Conference on College Composition and Communication in Portland in March. His paper was titled "Habit, Virtue, Writing."

Two books by Professor of Dogmatic and Constructive Theology Daniel Castelo have recently been published. His theodicy book in Spanish, El Dios Cristiano, Sufrimiento y Maldad: Una Exploracion desde el Punto de Vista de la Fe, was published by Kerigma. The publication coincided with his visit to Hope College and Western Theological Seminary in Holland, Michigan, in March. Daniel was part of a Q&A session on Pentecostalism and Latinidad, and he delivered a lecture titled "First World Theodical Problems" to a theology workshop sponsored by both institutions. The book is available online.

His other book, Pentecostalism as a Christian Mystical Tradition, was just published by Eerdmans. It was supported by a grant from the Center for Scholarship and Faculty Development. In the book, Daniel looks at the Pentecostal movement's methodology and epistemology as he carefully distinguishes it from American evangelicalism. He’s also created a podcast and blog introducing the book.

The Office of Human Resources would like the SPU community to welcome the following new staff members. Contact information can be found in the online SPU White Pages.

Elijah Cabiles, web designer II, University Communications
Ashley Karlstad, microsystems analyst, Computer and Information Systems
Abbie Wright, head coach – women’s volleyball, Athletics

A message from Adrienne Meier, University Archivist: “On motion of H H Pease [sic] it was ordered that the school be opened on Tuesday the 4^th of April 1893,” reads the small handwritten notice in the Board of Trustees minutes. Alexander and Adelaide Beers began teaching classes to a handful of students in the Red Brick Building (later Alexander Hall) on April 4, 1893. And 125 years later, faculty are still teaching classes to students at Seattle Pacific. Select the link to read the original notice in the Board of Trustees minutes.

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From SPU Master Gardener Jeff Daley: Since I typically get to work early, it’s not unusual for me to see students scurrying to breakfast at Gwinn Commons or an 8 a.m. class in Demaray Hall. After a recent dusting of snow last quarter, I couldn’t help but notice other evidence of “scurrying,” this time attributed to several critters that live on or near our campus grounds. There in the fresh snowfall, I could see their little prints marking their daily routine, undaunted by the blanket of white. 

Our campus is home to many varieties of wildlife that we don't even notice because of our busy schedules. That morning I saw two sets of raccoon tracks, perhaps a mother and cub, who had come down the stairs from Sixth Avenue West toward Martin Square and then turned sharply onto the westside of our Urban Wildlife Habitat by Ames Library. They probably heard me coming and made a quick exit as I shoveled snow at the bottom of the Gwinn stairway.

For more than 26 years, I’ve been tending the gardens at SPU. During that time, I’ve seen a wide variety of “city critters” in our Urban Wildlife Habitat area, including raccoons, rabbits, opossum, grey squirrels, and yes, a few rats and a lot of mice. And those are the usual suspects. There are other, more unique guests, too.

Just last year we had a barred owl (best known as a “hoot owl” for its distinctive call) that took up residency in several campus trees during the daylight hours. I watched it one afternoon on the north side of Watson Hall as it perched in an arbutus tree, dozing and seemingly uninterested in two harassing crows. Speaking of crows, have you ever been bombarded by these feathered squawkers as you've tried to make your way through Tiffany Loop in the spring?

Closer to the ground, grey squirrels love to bury acorns, walnuts, and even peanuts in the campus flower pots, especially those by Martin Square and the library. Disregarding the floral display, they simply move the petals out of the way to bury their prizes--much to my chagrin. Song birds have also found those pots just right for building their nests. Recently, a family of dark-eyed juncos and a couple of house finches nested in the same pots under the geraniums, marigolds, and petunias. In addition, the happy little campus moles love to leave their mountains of dirt, marking their pathways in the soft turf.

When conducting their duties, Facility and Project Management employees have come face to face with hissing opossums hiding under the eaves of buildings, families of squirrels, and a few pigeons who have taken up residence in the attic of Peterson Hall. Falcons and bald eagles have also been seen circling campus looking for a few unsuspecting critters and nearby neighborhood cats. Fortunately, as the keeper of the garden, I’ve only seen a few wild rabbits over the years. Of all our furry friends, they might be the most destructive to the perennial plants that I hold dear.

Yes, wildlife abounds on campus. All we need do is slow down and watch for these furry and feathered neighbors going about their daily lives among us. Any disruption that they might bring to our landscape is minimal when you weigh the joy they bring to our community. Well, except for maybe the moles.

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