The Faculty/Staff Bulletin is the weekly, internal e-newsletter for all SPU faculty and staff. Most items are submitted by its readers, and faculty and staff are encouraged to submit information to fsb-editor@spu.edu or by selecting “Submit News” at the bottom of the Bulletin.

The Bulletin is published on Mondays, and the deadline to submit information is the preceding Thursday. Submissions may be edited for clarity. The editor is Tracy Norlen, director of public information in University Communications. The Bulletin is divided into several sections.

Campus News & Events highlights the major news and events on campus. Only events related to SPU will be accepted. All faculty and staff are encouraged to submit information including department news, campus events, and guest speakers on campus. Digital photos and graphics are required for each entry. When possible, event information will be published two weeks prior to the event. Remember to plan ahead when submitting information.

Faculty & Staff News is for professional information related to your position at SPU or in higher education. Items of interest are conferences attended, books or articles written or published, presentations made, awards received, or research completed. We especially would like more professional news from staff.

SPU in the News lists most of the print or broadcast media appearances by faculty and staff. If you've been used as a resource for a reporter, let us know by submitting the information to the Bulletin.

From the Archives is a monthly feature showcasing photographs and stories from the SPU archives provided by University Archivist Adrienne Meier. The feature is published the last week of each month during the academic year, and is not published during the summer months.

This Month in the Garden is a monthly feature written by SPU head gardener Jeff Daley, highlighting some of the plants, flowers, trees, and landscaping on campus. This feature contains photos taken by Jeff and a description of the plants. This feature is not published during the summer months.

Milestones is for personal news of interest to the SPU community, including births, adoptions, marriages, anniversaries, church services, mission trips, awards, and athletic accomplishments. Digital photos are always welcome. This section is also used for memorial service information.

A message from Alison Estep, assistant vice president, University Communications: Watch for upcoming global navigation changes to spu.edu this week to improve the web experience of our visitors by simplifying and creating a cleaner, more task-based approach to navigation. We are moving away from using too much SPU-specific jargon that may not mean much to an outside audience and focusing on the top tasks of prospective students. This moves the website from audience-based navigation to topic-based navigation, and uses best practices for usability on higher education sites. The new navigation has been built after benchmarking other university websites and pulls from published research on how to create a better user experience on higher education websites. The hope is this will make spu.edu more intuitive and provide a strong focus on completing top tasks for our prospective student audience which include learning about costs, majors/minors, campus life, scheduling a visit, requesting information, and applying.

The 19th annual Sacred Sounds of Christmas, featuring the SPU Music Department’s nationally recognized student and faculty musicians performing traditional Advent and Christmas carols from around the world, is Sunday, November 25, 7 p.m. in Benaroya Hall in downtown Seattle. The concert is a consistent sellout, and tickets are now available. 

Paul Willis, author of Deer at Twilight, a collection of poems about the fauna and flora of the North Cascades, will read from his writings on Thursday, September 27, at 4:30 p.m. in the CIS Conference Room in lower Marston. (Please enter from the east exterior of Marston Hall). Paul, a former national park artist-in-residence, is also the author of To Build a Trail: Essays on Curiosity, Love and Wonder, inspired by his experience of building a trail on the Westmont campus. Paul is also the brother of Dan Willis, former manager of the SPU Bookstore. 

A group exhibit that will look at “drawing from the fringes” opens Monday, October 1, at the SPAC (Seattle Pacific Art Center Gallery.) The exhibit will open to the public on Thursday, October 18. Zack Bent, assistant professor of art, is the curator for the exhibit. “Drawing is taken as a core skill and way of knowing in art education. My approach here has been to find those experimental places where artists are exploring in their practice ways of seeing that have a loose or direct connection with drawing expressed through a host of mediums — text, printmaking, sculpture, photography, video, painting, and found object/appropriation.” SPAC is open Monday–Friday, 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. Admission is free.(Image credit: Hanita Schwartz Relicaptia, P. 50, 2015-18, Photograph After The Raft of the Medusa by Géricault.)

A message from Dining Services: This fall, Dining Services restructured its management team. Please welcome our new leaders and those who have changed positions or been promoted: 

Campus Executive Chef Chris Studtmann
Retail Manager Tracy Luepnitz
Gwinn Commons Dining Hall Director of Operations Loida Arabia Kennedy
Gwinn Service Manager Sandy Chinn
Catering Manager Carina Westover

For more information, visit the News Page on our dining website.

Update: The Nickerson Repaving Project will return for its third segment of construction as soon as Friday, September 28, and last for five months. This will affect primarily the area leading up to the Ballard Bridge around 14th and 15th streets. Please expect delays and detours, and plan your commute to SPU accordingly to allow for extra time. Visit the Seattle Department of Transportation website for more information.

Faculty and staff can receive a free Choose-to-Reuse (CTR) container when they purchase a Faculty/Staff  Block 10 Meal Plan through Friday, October 5. (Limit one per person.) The CTR container allows you to take food from Gwinn Commons. You can use the block-10 plan in Gwinn Commons any time during service hours, or you can use it to purchase Simply to Go meals at the Corner Place Market and Academic Perks in the SUB, or at Common Grounds in Weter Hall. Meals can be used for guests, too.The plan costs $82 and can be purchased through Banner. The CTR container will be available in University Services the business day after you purchase your plan. Meal balances roll from quarter to quarter as long as you are employed at the University. If you have questions, contact Housing and Meal Plan Services at 206-281-2188 or mealplan@spu.edu.

You have until 9:59 a.m. on Tuesday, October 2, to have stationery orders delivered Friday, October 12. Stationery orders are delivered once a month. Orders made after 10 a.m. on October 4 will be delivered on November 16. For more information, contact Hope McPherson in University Communications at hmcpherson@spu.edu.

A message from Alumni and Parent Relations: Save the date for Homecoming and Family Weekend, February 1–3, 2019. Planning is underway for this once-a-year gathering for the entire campus community. Events include academic department reunions, the Alumni Awards Dinner, Falcons Hall of Fame Ceremony, men’s basketball game against the Western Washington University Vikings, SPU Theatre Department’s winter mainstage production, and more. Registration opens in November. Stay tuned for more details this winter!

The Faculty/Staff Bulletin is published every week 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, September 27. The next Bulletin will be published on Monday, October 1.

In recognition of his service to the SPU community, Neal DeWitt, Multi-Skilled Trades II for mechanical and electrical in Facility and Project Management, was nominated by his peers and selected by Staff Council as the September Staff Member of the Month. Congratulations and thank you, Neal!

Learn more about Neal and nominate a colleague for recognition on the Staff Council website.

For her new book A Light So Lovely: The Spiritual Legacy of Madeleine L’Engle (Zondervan 2018), author Sarah Arthur interviewed Assistant Professor of Writing Jeffrey Overstreet about how L'Engle's spiritual writing and science fiction novels inspired his faith and his four novels. Excerpts from their conversation appear in the book. Jeffrey was also a guest on The Trace for an episode called "Medicine for an Ailing America," where they discussed films that offer meaningful contributions to conversations about current cultural crises.

Brad Murg, assistant professor of political science and director of global development studies, was invited to speak on current challenges in Cambodia-Vietnam economic relations on September 19. This was as part of a daylong dialogue between the Cambodia Institute for Cooperation and Peace and the Center for Strategic Studies and International Development in Hanoi.

Brad also drafted the concept paper and was one of main organizers for the conference “Whither the Indo-Pacific Strategy: Shifting the Strategic Landscape in the Asia-Pacific Region” sponsored by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh, which took place on September 20 and 21. At this round table event, Brad chaired a panel examining structural changes in regional security and set out the shifting dynamics of the contemporary Chinese economy.

The Office of Human Resources would like to welcome the following new staff members to SPU.

Sasha Anderson, seasonal assistant women’s basketball coach, Athletics
Kathleen Cochran, office manager and events coordinator, School of Business, Government, and Economics
May Tag Yang, interim department administrator and Office of University Ministries programs coordinator, Office of University Ministries.

The New York Times recently included an article about research done by Professor of Biology Cara Wall-Scheffler and alumna Leah Bouterse ’17. They’re study, which compared individuals in Mukono, Uganda, and Seattle, revealed cultural differences in the way men and women move.

From University Archivist Adrienne Meier: The new SPU logo marks the latest in a line of logos and typography used to identify Seattle Pacific. See a timeline of past logos and the dates they were used.