Presidential Perspective - March 8, 2018

Baylor Students, Faculty and Staff:

The Baylor campus sure is still and quiet with all of our students on Spring Break this week! But I know our faculty and staff who remained in Waco to prepare for the remainder of the semester are enjoying the wonderful spring weather.

Here are a few noteworthy items to share:

• Last week I had the opportunity to travel to Washington, D.C., for a couple of days to meet with several members of the Texas delegation, as well as many other leaders in Congress and staff of the House Appropriations Committee. This is an extremely important time for colleges and universities across the country as the long-overdue reauthorization of the Higher Education Act is currently underway. I was excited to run into several of our student leaders who were also in D.C. as part of the Big 12 on the Hill Conference. What a great group of representatives for Baylor!

• The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program continues to be in flux and is an ongoing discussion point with members of Congress for colleges and universities as we provide the proper hospitality, care and support for students. Baylor's own Laura Hernandez, law school professor and co-founder of the Baylor Law Immigration Clinic, is a national expert on this issue and provided a timely overview of DACA in a recent Baylor Connections podcast in conjunction with KWBU Radio.

• Baylor was honored to host the Big 12 Conference on Black Student Government last week, as the 675 attendees discussed issues facing African-American student government organizations and participated in many leadership opportunities. The student-driven event dates back to 1977, prior to the merger of the Big Eight and Southwest Conferences in the mid-1990s.

• I suspect that many of you are trying to catch up on sleep during Spring Break. You might be interested to know that Dr. Michael K. Scullin, director of Baylor's Sleep Neuroscience and Cognition Laboratory, says that “recovery sleep” surprisingly does not provide the perceived benefits. Here are nine sleep myths that Dr. Scullin answers with the science that proves or disproves them.

• The locations are set for our upcoming on-campus installments of the Baylor Conversation Series, during which we will provide an overview of Illuminate – the Academic Strategic Plan. Please make plans to join Interim Provost Michael K. McLendon and me on either March 27 at 3:30 p.m. in Foster 250 or April 6 at 1:30 p.m. in the Barfield Drawing Room. Faculty, staff and students are invited.

I look forward to seeing everyone back on the Baylor campus next week!

Linda A. Livingstone, Ph.D.
President