GONZAGA FACULTY AND STAFF NEWSLETTER
SEPTEMBER 2022
VOL. 24 | #1
› Suspiciously ‘Nice’
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› Singing CLL’s Praises
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› Pre-Orientation Trip Saved
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› Coming and Going
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Provost Kopp Explores Living and Learning Communities, New Student Targets and Mission at Work New Provost Sacha (SAH-shuh) Kopp came to Gonzaga in June following a career served at large, mostly public institutions, including University of Nebraska at Omaha, Syracuse University, University of Texas and State University of New York at Stony Brook. So why Gonzaga? He answered that, gave a sense of his early days here on campus and explained some of his future thinking when he met with the University’s Regents via Zoom on July 21. His dad taught 40 years at Catholic Loras College in Dubuque, Iowa. His kids attended Lutheran schools and he witnessed their formative experiences. His wife, Gretchen, is seeking ordination in the Lutheran Church and serves as Protestant chaplain at Creighton University. “I am excited to be a part of a faith-based university at Gonzaga,” he said. His early days here included meeting people, learning their perspectives and understanding their recent experiences. “I try to understand what we need to do to help people move past the impact of the pandemic.” He has met all his deans and is impressed by their leadership. Several arrived in the midst of the pandemic and are learning how best to serve their staff and students on the fly. “I will support them however I can,” he told Regents.
Early Observations and Insights He is aware of how quickly the campus, workforce and student body have grown in the last two decades but sees that Gonzaga may not have “scaled up” fast enough to support the growth. “How can we better support each other?” he asked. “As we return to campus full time, there is a lot of thought as to what it means to be a residential campus in 2022,” Kopp said. “As a Jesuit university, attending to the whole student experience, what will we do different to bring students to this loving and learning community? We need to take a fresh look at our housing plan, not just buildings but where
students will be living and what they will be learning while they are here.” He noted great work being done in the academic sector to build on the solid liberal arts foundation of Gonzaga and develop compelling academic programs for the future. He toured biology labs and learned a lot about what some of his faculty are studying. Undergraduate research allows students to learn by doing. “This forms unique experiences of what students can do here,” he said. In a broader campus Provost Sacha Kopp is looking for GU to develop new academic conversation, he programs in areas of high demand. addressed President McCulloh’s desire to update the current goals of the University’s Strategic Plan, which were change our student body and it will change us crafted in 2015. “The goals in the Strategic and enrich our campus community.” Plan include many that have since been “Serving students coming out of high school accomplished,” he said. “Construction of and off to a college campus is an important the Bollier and Woldson centers, retention audience for us. But we need to think about exceeding 90% (first-year to sophomore), extending the invitation to other audiences ranking in the top 100 of all universities in – adult learners and professionals. We are the United States. With all those boxes being embarking on work life now that looks checked, it’s natural to ask what’s next. What nothing like it did when I graduated from aggressive goals will we seek and what will college,” he said. “The notion that we’ll learn make us current in 2030 that we didn’t know everything for a career at age 21 and move on in 2010?” is outdated. He talked about the importance of defining “The Center for Lifelong Learning and our potential audiences, saying there is no School of Leadership Studies are offering single approach. Gonzaga has little transfer certification programs that are more needed population, but this presents opportunities. now than ever,” Kopp continued. “The “Economic access will be key, providing a business community is doing it themselves. different set of support services for transfer Microsoft and Amazon are developing learning students as our current system really caters certificate programs for their employees. Why to traditional students,” he said. “Gonzaga not us?” must always strive to bring in a diverse array of students, recognizing the Jesuit mission to serve others. So, we have an opportunity to
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