Dear NMHU Community:

What a great slate of events for Homecoming—it was an inspiring and extremely busy week. We started off with the HU Talks, then we had the H-Club Hall of Fame Banquet on Thursday and the dedication of the Joseph E. and Nancy Montoya Student Union Building on Friday. That day wrapped up with the Cowboy Lounge. Saturday saw the Homecoming parade and the Homecoming game. Football won a close game against Chadron State, and our Women’s volleyball beat Mines for the first time in a long time.

Congratulations all around—to Coach Kurt for the win, to Coach Meg Grose for beating Colorado School of Mines for the first time in 20 years, to Weldon Chebon for getting National Cross Country Athlete of the week, and Shanna Halalilo and her team in athletics for organizing so many great athletic events, and particularly to the NMHU Foundation staff for all they did to make it a successful weekend. Much appreciation to Paul Grindstaff, Juli Salman, Nicole Boulom, Julie Tumblety, Vanessa Tenorio, Denice Spicer, and Gina Hartmann—I saw them at almost every event this past week. Without them, we couldn’t pull anything like this off.

Homecoming is always an important weekend for me—it gives a chance to think about how important NMHU is in the lives of our students and alumni. Seeing people return to our campus after years or decades and how much their time at Highlands meant to them—whether that was playing for our 1981 RMAC football championship team, or thinking about their academic experiences, or their many great interactions with our staff when they were on campus. The passion and commitment to NMHU is truly inspiring.

Lots of pictures below, and a few other events we’ve been taking part in:

Some Recent Highlights:

Two teams got inducted into the H-Club Hall of Fame–the 1998 Men’s Cross Country team, which placed 10th at the NCAA National Championships. Coach DeVries looked delighted to be honoring them:

The 1981 Football Team was also inducted. That team won the RMAC championship and it was great to see so many of our former athletes celebrating their achievement on our campus:

In addition to the teams I mentioned above, a number of individual athletes were inducted into the H-Club Hall of Fame: Rod “Iceman” Johnson for Football (1981-1984), Shanice McPherson for Track and Field (2012-2016), Jesse Boggs for Wrestling (2007-2010), David “Lightning” Montez for Football and Baseball (1976-1980), Jose “Majic” Medina for Basketball (1989-1991), and a special recognition (Posthumous) for Mark “Big Red Simpson,” Football (1977-1978).

On Friday morning, we unveiled the new name of our Student Union Building. Thanks to a generous donation from Joe Montoya, the building is now the “Joe E. & Nancy Montoya Student Union Building.” Joe gave a moving speech where he reminisced on his time at NMHU and challenged our administration, faculty, and staff to expand opportunities for our students to achieve, and I know that his donation will do just that as we continue to expand the mission of our university.

The Cowboy Lounge on Friday evening was a fun event–we held both a silent and live auction and the proceeds from that will go to our Foundation. Thank you to everyone who generously bid–including those fortunate enough (unfortunate enough?) to win the dinner at the president’s residence!

On Monday, I headed up to Los Alamos with a team that included Regent Bill Garcia, Regent Robert Lucero and his partner Aimeé González, Provost Roxanne Gonzales, Dean Veena Parboteeah, and Chief of Staff Brandon Kempner to meet with LANL Director Thomas Mason and members of his team to discuss opportunities for continued collaboration. Many of our graduates work at LANL, and the LANL Foundation has been very generous in supporting programs at NMHU, including our new Supply Chain Management concentrations.

If the last few weeks weren’t busy enough . . . we had an on-campus retreat for our Expanded Cabinet on campus on Tuesday 10/15 and Wednesday 10/16 to explore how we can improve the culture and outcomes here at NMHU. It was a great discussion that brought together campus governance and union leaders, administrators, and staff members from a number of different departments. I look forward to implementing some of the ideas we discussed and of further exploring how to make Highlands the best university possible.

Upcoming Events:

It must be fall! Hard to believe that basketball season is almost upon us, but our men’s and women’s basketball teams kick-off their 2024-2025 campaigns with upcoming exhibition games. The women’s team will scrimmage the University of New Mexico at the Pit in Albuquerque on Sunday, October 20th, 2:00 PM, and our men’s team scrimmages against New Mexico State in Las Cruces on Monday, November 4th, at 7:00 PM. Hope to see you there!

In between those, I’ll be heading out to the HACU Annual Conference. HACU, the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities, is a long-standing and important advocate for Hispanic-serving institutions. NMHU was a founding member. Provost Gonzales will be presenting, and I’m looking forward to connecting with this crucial organization and generating some new ideas for our campus.

I’ll be spending a full day visiting our Albuquerque center on Thursday, October 24th, and learning more about Social Work programs and our many community partners in the Albuquerque area. We’re also having a “Meet the President” event that evening, at the Bow and Arrow Brewery, at 608 McKnight Ave NW. Join us if you are able.

Congratulations:

• During Homecoming Week, we honored four of our own. Carmelita Sanchez was given the 2024 Young Almuna Award, Shantini Ramakrishnan received the 2024 Highlands Spirit Award, Linda Valencia Martinez received the Distinguished Alumna award, and Regent Cody Rivera was the Forever Cowboy Student Awardee and honored on the field at the game. See https://www.nmhu.edu/2024/ for more information about each of them.

• NMHU’s very own New Mexico Forest and Watershed Restoration Institute’s Geographic Information System (GIS) team consisting of Katie Withnall, Dana Heusinkveld, Elizabeth Becker, and led by Patti Dappen have been working hard to develop some readily available tools for decision makers and property owners during a wildfire event. In response to the Hermit’s Peak Calf Canyon fire of 2022, the GIS team developed the NM Fire Viewer to provide up-to-date information on active fire conditions. For those affected by the fire, the web map proved to be an invaluable resource–it had over 350,000 views during the crisis. The viewer has since been expanded to include all of New Mexico, and displays current and historical fire perimeters, active satellite hot spots, United States Geological Survey (USGS) burn severity assessments, smoke forecasts, home/building footprints, fuel treatment reduction projects, and other useful information. During this past summer’s 2024 Salt and South Fork Fires in Ruidoso, the NM Fire Viewer was accessed over 200,000 times and a fire viewer link was posted on the City of Ruidoso website as the site to access fire information. For more information, you can visit the Fire Viewer page at: website:  https://nmfireviewer.org/  Here’s an example of the important public work the NMFWRI is doing:

• NMHU’s Institute for Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Learning and Teaching (ICLRLT) hosted its Fall Summit October 12th where we introduced our five new Justice and Equity Faculty in Residence. A screening of the documentary “In the Dirt” opened the event. We were so privileged to have panelists Albert Avery and Jotham Ippel, Social Workers from the Gallup McKinley Public Schools, and Silver Stallion Founders Randy Bitue and Tanisha Bitsoi all featured in the documentary. An inspirational morning led into afternoon working groups. The ICLRLT Advisory Committee began planning the 2025 Summer Summit with School University Partnerships Director Doug Earick, and Rod Rock facilitated Norteños Leadership Rising funded by the NMPED. Rebecca Moore facilitated the Indigenous Knowledge Roadmap, and Elisabeth Valenzuela the Dual Language Toolkit both funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Special thanks to Mike Petronis and John and Julia DiRuggiero, who facilitated our GIS working group.

• Congratulations to Weldon Chebon, Men’s Cross Country, who was named Division II athlete of the week by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.

If you have an item or event you’d like to be featured here, please forward that to your relevant Vice President.

Respectfully,

Dr. Neil Woolf
President, New Mexico Highlands University