A Note from the Provost

Dear Colleagues,

This week marks an important leadership transition for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and for Academic Affairs more broadly.

Please join me in welcoming Dr. Christopher Jones as the new Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Chris officially begins his appointment today and has already spent time engaging with CLAS leadership and members of Provost’s Cabinet following the announcement of his appointment in February.

Throughout this transition, Chris has demonstrated a collaborative approach, a deep appreciation for the liberal arts and sciences, and genuine enthusiasm for the opportunities ahead at Grand Valley. I look forward to the leadership he will provide as CLAS continues to advance teaching, scholarship, creative activity, and student success.

As we welcome Chris, I also want to express my sincere gratitude to Dr. Donovan Anderson for his service as Interim Dean of CLAS. Donovan provided thoughtful and steady leadership during an important period of transition, always keeping students, faculty, and staff at the center of his work. We are grateful for his many contributions to the college and the university.

I am pleased that Donovan has now begun his new role as Vice Provost for Student Success and Experiential Learning in the Office of the Provost. In this position, he will help strengthen and expand student success initiatives and experiential learning opportunities across the university.

I also want to recognize Cathy Buyarski as she begins her new role as Executive Director for Student Success. For many years, Cathy has been a tireless advocate for students and a trusted leader within Academic Affairs. As Vice Provost for Advising and Student Success, she helped strengthen advising, advance student-centered initiatives, and improve the student experience for countless learners. I am deeply grateful for her years of service and pleased that she will continue this important work in her new position.

Leadership transitions provide an opportunity both to celebrate the contributions of those who have served and to welcome new perspectives and ideas. Please join me in thanking Donovan and Cathy for their leadership and service and in welcoming Chris to the Grand Valley community.

Best,

Jen

After an eventful year, we want to provide an update on our collective COACHE/Shared Leadership work. 

Since 2023, GVSU faculty, staff, and administrators have invested a great deal of time and effort to learn and act on faculty satisfaction data. The Collaborative on Academic Careers in Higher Education (COACHE) Faculty Job Satisfaction Survey was administered in Winter 2024, surveying faculty to assess the strengths and weaknesses of GVSU's structures and norms. During the past year, the Shared Leadership Steering Committee (SLSC), which included 23 faculty, staff, and administrators, provided leadership to act on our commitments to shared leadership, with representation from as many impacted constituencies as possible, promoting a culture of effective shared governance and shared leadership among faculty, staff, and administration to actively support our mission. These leaders were supported by external facilitators Dr. Mary Papazian and Dr. Susan Elrod, who have repeatedly acknowledged this work as "unprecedented" in their experience, both in terms of scale and in terms of investment at all levels.

During the past year, four subcommittees of the SLSC developed recommended actions that university leaders, faculty shared governance bodies, faculty, staff, and administrators could take on to improve our culture of shared leadership and shared governance. The recommendations developed in Fall 2025 were workshopped with GVSU's Senior Leadership Team and Provost's Cabinet in a March retreat and were also shared with GVSU University Academic Senate (UAS) for feedback. In May 2026, SLSC convened further conversations with leaders across the university, including UAS representatives and other thought leaders.

Several novel ideas for improvements in governance structures, budget transparency and literacy, internal communications, and faculty/staff professional development have emerged. Some have been implemented, while others are on track for implementation by faculty governance; the Office of the Provost; the Division of People, Equity, and Culture; and others. The faculty senate also instantiated two task forces to consider items of concern from the COACHE findings: the nature of teaching; the nature or service.

The SLSC was always intended to be a committee that fostered these ideas that then would be built into the existing systems and structures at GVSU. So, as these recommendations are being moved to their appropriate institutional spaces, the work of the SLSC has ended. Thank you to all SLSC members!

We appreciate the work and investment of not only members of the SLSC but of the senior administrators, junior administrators, faculty, staff, and students who have shared not only their time, but our commitment to strengthening shared leadership and shared governance.

In August, look to Lakers Ready for a communication regarding sharing a report of the May meeting between SLT and faculty and staff leadership, as well as a list of upcoming actions for this academic year.

More information about COACHE at GVSU and the SLSC is available on the Office of the Provost website.

Krista Benson and Ed Aboufadel, SLSC co-chairs

Updates

Workday Student training opportunities are coming this fall. Training will start in November 2026 for Advisors, Professional Support Staff (PSS), Assistant/Associate Deans, Unit Heads, and additional student-facing roles. Faculty who have any role in advising students will begin training in late January 2027. Faculty without advising responsibilities will begin training in August 2027. More details, including course offerings and registration information, will be shared in the coming months.

Ongoing updates and resources related to new executive orders, federal memos, and other important federal actions are available on Division of People, Equity, and Culture website. Updates on executive orders impacting federally-funded projects can be found on the Office of Sponsored Programs website.

Engaged Scholarship

Congrats to Al Steinman, Professor of Water Resources at the Annis Water Resources Institute, for "Lake Michigan Long-term Ecological Research Program: Lake Michigan Field Station Support 2026." This is a National Oceanic and Atmospheric (NOAA) grant administered by the University of Michigan.

Congratulations to Rahat Rafiq, Assistant Professor of Computing, for two recent contracts with Laker Neuro Consulting and Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary. These are contracts for the College of Computing's Blue Nucleus Applied Computing Institute which provides GVSU students with real-world experience working with the broader community to solve computing issues.

Elizabeth Stolle, Professor of Literacy, Educational Foundations, and Technology, authored Critical Friendship as a Self-Study Research Tool. This book provides qualitative scholars in self-study with timely research and practical resources for applying critical friendship as a research tool. Drawing on over two decades of engagement as critical friends, the authors advocate for critical friendship as a means to enhance research rigor. Click here to learn more about this book.

Events

Register to attend the 32nd Annual Fall Conference on Teaching and Learning. Keynote Presentation by Dr. Tracie Marcella Addy (Rutgers University), session titled "Teaching for Student Success: Designing Learning Environments That Help Students Thrive."
All faculty and staff are welcome. Space is limited, so reserve your spot today! Questions? Reach out to Maggie Goss (gossmar@gvsu.edu) or the Pew FTLC (pewftlc@gvsu.edu).

Each Tuesday evening through June 30 - August 4 from 5-7 p.m., Valley Campus, enjoy an outdoor carillon concert. Bring a lawn chair or spread a blanket in the beautiful heart of GVSU's Valley Campus, enjoy local food truck fare, and take in concerts from some of the top touring carillon performers in the nation. Visit the Carillons of GVSU website to learn more about this concert series. All performances are free, family-friendly, and open to the public.

Important Dates and Links

Previously Shared Events
6/23-6/24 - Examinations for 1st 6 weeks
6/29 - Faculty Sabbatical Proposal Workshop Q&A Session, 2:00 p.m., Virtual
9/15 - GV Technology Summit 2026 Proposals Due
7/3 - Independence Day Recess
8/10-11 - Examinations for 2nd 6 and 12 weeks 

Links
Lakers Ready - repository of this newsletter and a link to submit content
Laker Family Network - repository of the monthly newsletter sent by the Division of Student Affairs to GVSU parents/supporters
Laker Weekly - repository of the weekly e-newsletter sent by the Division of Student Affairs to current GVSU students
Inclusion and Equity Institute Workshops - Inclusion and Equity Institute offers free, dynamic, and helpful workshops on a variety of topics

Lakers Ready will be distributed on the 2nd and 4th Monday of each month.