Have you made your gift to the Wake Forest Fund this fiscal year? If not, University Advancement asks that you consider making a contribution today, Tuesday, June 18.

For 24 hours only, Wake Foresters can take advantage of two different gift match opportunities. If the University raises $100,000 for the Wake Forest Fund, a fellow Deacon will match it dollar for dollar. And, if there are at least 500 total donations (of any amount), the Wake Forest Fund will get an additional $25,000.

The 24-hour period runs today from midnight to 11:59 p.m.

This video explains how the Wake Forest Fund supports student aid, faculty development, emerging programs for students, library and technology resources, and facilities renovation. The social media hashtag is #Wake500.

With the end of the fiscal year approaching, each and every gift is appreciated.

On Saturday, June 15, between 7 a.m. and noon, the Virtual Private Network (VPN) will not be available. Information Systems will perform required maintenance on the VPN. Users will not be able to maintain or establish a new a connection to VPN during this time.

If you have questions regarding this maintenance, please contact the Information Systems Service Desk at xHELP (4357) or help@wfu.edu.

Beginning July 1, Wake Forest  will offer a tax equality benefit for same-sex domestic partners of Reynolda Campus faculty and staff.

Wake Forest has offered same-sex domestic partner benefits to faculty and staff for more than 13 years; however, due to IRS regulations, individuals taking advantage of these benefits pay more than their heterosexual, married colleagues. With the introduction of this benefit, the University is striving to create parity for all faculty and staff by providing participants who have same-sex domestic partners with compensation to offset the additional amount they pay.

“The addition of the tax-equity benefit is a further demonstration of Wake Forest’s commitment to all members of our campus community,” said President Nathan Hatch. “It seems appropriate that this comes at a time when we have recognized so many examples of diversity and inclusion during our ‘Faces of Courage’ year-long celebration.”

The Wake Forest LGBTQ Center, which opened in August 2011, worked in partnership with Human Resources on this initiative.

“We’re thrilled to see Wake at the forefront, championing LGBTQ equity in higher education with the addition of this benefit,” said LGBTQ Center director Angela Mazaris. “This is a great example of Wake Forest’s commitment to diversity and inclusion in action.”

Wake Forest joins the ranks of prestigious universities such as Princeton, Yale, Syracuse, University of Pennsylvania, Barnard, and Bowdoin College in providing this benefit.

Perry Patterson, recently retired professor of economics and longtime LGBTQ advocate at Wake Forest, applauded the University’s decision, stating: “Many WFU faculty and staff will be most grateful for this policy move. It demonstrates clearly the University’s commitment that Pro Humanitate must fully apply to all members of the community.”

The Special Collections & Archives Department, located in the Z. Smith Reynolds Library at Wake Forest, has been awarded the Davis C. Woolley Award for Achievement in Assessing and Preserving Baptist History.

Presented by the president of the Society on May 22 during the annual meeting of the Baptist History and Heritage Society, the award is given to an individual or a state program that demonstrated great progress and achievements during the preceding calendar year.

The North Carolina Baptist Historical Collection at Wake Forest (also known as the Ethel Taylor Crittenden Collection in Baptist History) documents the history of North Carolina Baptist churches, institutions, and individuals. The collection contains materials on Southern, Missionary, Primitive, African-American, Union and Alliance of Baptist churches. These materials include more than 16,000 books, periodicals, association annuals and other printed materials. In addition, there are more than 1,000 biographical folders containing information on and photographs of Baptist pastors and Wake Forest alumni.

Over the past year, the Department has partnered with UNC-Chapel Hill and Duke University on a grant project called Religion in North Carolina, answered numerous reference questions and processed several important Baptist collections, including those of Warren Carr, Wayne Oates and Bill Leonard. Especially noteworthy are the papers of Henlee Barnette, who was a Wake Forest alumnus, professor of Christian Ethics at Southern Baptist Seminary, civil rights activist, writer and speaker. Continue reading »

Starting the week of June 10, excavation of the front entrance of Greene Hall will begin to complete needed repairs. The repair project will last approximately nine weeks, and the Greene Hall main entrance from Manchester Court will be closed during this time.

At this time, no disruption to services in Greene or Carswell halls is expected.

On Monday, June 10, the parking circle in front of the ZSR Library will be closed from about 7:30 a.m. until about 2 p.m. The closure is to allow crane access to the building to set a new air handling unit for the Rare Books area. A safe access pathway will be set up to allow access to the main entrance of the library.

By saving 139,196 gallons of water, Wake Forest placed among the top five schools in the country in the Campus Conservation Nationals 2013 competition for greatest average reduction of water usage in residence halls.

More than 120 colleges and universities participated in the three-week competition.

From Feb. 4 to April 26, campus teams for residence halls tracked their energy conservation efforts using the Building Dashboard. In addition to water usage, they also tracked electricity usage in residence halls. Wake Forest collectively saved 74,789 kilowatt hours of electricity during the competition.

Campus Conservation Nationals (CCN) is the largest nationwide electricity and water reduction competition on college and university campuses. In its third year, CCN gives a common voice and motivation to hundreds of thousands of students, all working together to reduce consumption.

Ravish Paul, Wake Forest’s energy manager, facilitated the University’s participation in the competition in partnership with Residence Life and Housing office. Claire Nagy-Kato, a Wake Forest junior and an intern for the Office of Energy Management, helped coordinate Wake Forest’s efforts.

Next week, the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) will begin making changes around the University Parkway entrance and exit to help ensure the safety of motorists, cyclists and pedestrians.

Construction in the area is expected to begin June 3 and last approximately three weeks.

Upon project completion, drivers will no longer be able to make left turns from Wake Forest Road onto University Parkway. Motorists who wish to travel north on University Parkway are encouraged to use the Polo Road exit, proceed a short distance on Long Drive and then turn left onto University Parkway.

Other than experiencing temporary lane closures, drivers making right turns onto University Parkway South will not be impacted, nor will those entering campus from either direction on University Parkway.

NCDOT provided this approximate timeline:

• Monday, June 3 – NCDOT will begin lengthening the queue lane on University Parkway South at Lakewood Drive in anticipation of more cars making U-turns at Lakewood Drive. Traffic signs around the University Parkway exit signaling the upcoming change will also be posted.
• Monday, June 10 – Left turns from Wake Forest Road onto University Parkway will no longer be permitted. Construction around the exit will begin at this time.
• Friday, June 21 – NCDOT expects construction to be completed.

The NCDOT and Wake Forest Department of Parking and Transportation appreciate your cooperation and patience as these changes are made to improve the safety of those entering and exiting our campus.

Anyone who has questions may contact Alex Crist, director of parking and transportation, at 758-2558 or cristaj@wfu.edu.

The University Calendar (http://calendar.wfu.edu) doesn’t see a lot of visits in the summer. But that doesn’t mean things aren’t happening.

Communications and External Relations (CER) Digital is launching a new University calendar application Thursday, June 6, to make it easier to submit events and, in turn, attract more attendees to those events.

The new calendar is a partnership with the online calendaring solution Localist. Other partners with Localist include Cornell University, Johns Hopkins University, and Georgetown University.

Students, faculty and staff are all invited to use the new calendar to submit and share their events. But that’s not the only feature this calendar offers: Continue reading »

This message is provided by Hof Milam, the senior vice president for finance and administration:

University Stores and its employees have served our campus well for many years.  However, in the face of a rapidly changing industry and declining financial performance, the University had to begin considering other service delivery models earlier this year.

After careful consideration, the University has selected Follett Higher Education Group to manage all University Stores locations beginning this summer.  Follett, the nation’s largest operator of college bookstores, serves more than 5 million students at more than 1,600 physical and online stores and employs approximately 10,000 associates worldwide.  Follett has longstanding relationships with many colleges and universities, including Stanford, Boston College, Georgetown and Kentucky.

The selection of Follett was made following an extensive request for proposal process. The University considered proposals from three management companies, as well as a presentation by our current management team. In the end, Follett’s proposal offered the greatest financial improvement to the University, substantially better than our current self-operating model.  Contracting with Follett also mitigates the University’s risk in attempting to compete in the increasingly digitized campus bookstore business. Continue reading »