Faculty Senate approved March 12–16, 2018, for next year’s Spring Break.
—Nancy Geiger, Student Records and Academic Information
Category Archives: Campus Announcements Archive
Social media directory audit
The Drake University Social Media Directory displays the URLs for every Drake-affiliated social media page. Take a look around to see which departments have pages, follow them, and invite your friends to follow along. While you’re looking around, let us know if your department page has changed—maybe you have a department name change, you want a new cover photo, or you don’t see your URL on the directory at all. Either way, let us know by emailing Niki Smith at niki.smith@drake.edu.
If you want to learn more about creating an official presence on social media for your department or unit, reach out to Niki Smith.
Also, there is a student social media directory for all student organizations. Niki is also the contact for that directory if you see anything to add or update.
—Niki Smith, University Communications
Free online training for Drake students, faculty, staff
Lynda.com is an online subscription library offered free to all Drake students, faculty, and staff that teaches the latest software, creative, and business skills through high-quality instructional videos.
With more than 3,700 courses, Lynda.com is designed for all levels of learners and is available whenever you’re ready to learn—even on your mobile device.
Benefits to using Lynda.com include:
- Unlimited access to courses on a wide variety of technologies and disciplines
- New courses added every week
- Tutorials taught by recognized industry experts
- Access to exercise files to follow along as you learn
- Beginner to advanced courses
To get started, visit the Campus Life tab in blueView.
—Carla Herling, Information Technology Services
Upcoming Engaged Citizen Experience Conference
Drake will host a free conference examining how local, state, national, and international demographics will change in coming years. Though the theme was chosen long before the presidential election, organizers say the conference is particularly relevant in the weeks after President Donald Trump’s controversial executive order restricting immigration and travel.
The 2017 Engaged Citizen Experience Conference, “Demographic Opportunities and Challenges: Domestic and International,” will be held Friday, Feb. 24, beginning at noon in the upper level of Drake’s Olmsted Center. The event is free and open to the public; advance registration is requested via the conference website. Learn more about the conference in the Drake Newsroom.
Donate your old cell phone
Drake Public Safety has partnered with the 911 Cell Phone Bank, a nonprofit organization providing emergency-only cell phones to those who otherwise may not have access to an emergency line when it matters most. If you have an unused cell phone you would like to donate to help those in need, please drop it off at the Public Safety Office.
—Brett Niederhauser, Drake Public Safety
Learn about: Cowles Library resources
Did you know Cowles Library has more than 250 databases available to Drake students, faculty, and staff? We’re highlighting these valuable resources on the Cowles Library blog. Learn more about how JoVE Biology (and JoVE Neurology) 2017 and MathSciNet can help you!
—Leslie Noble, Cowles Library
New group fitness classes
The Group X program has added a couple new classes this semester. Come check out Step & Sculpt on Fridays at 12:15 p.m. and the Walking Group on Thursdays at 12:15 p.m.
Recipes from Home lunch in Hubbell Dining
Tuesday, Feb. 21, 11 a.m.–1 p.m.: Recipes from Home Lunch in Hubbell Dining
Please share with us your favorite recipes from home. We will choose several to feature during our lunch on Feb. 21! If your recipe is selected, you will also receive two meal tickets to lunch that day to share with family! Please email your recipe by Feb. 3 to jennifer.bowersox@drake.edu, along with the following information: Recipe name, recipe (ingredients, directions), a little about this recipe.
—Jennifer Bowersox, Sodexo
IMPORTANT: Reports of burglaries near campus
To all students, faculty, and staff:
As part of our continuing effort to keep the campus community informed about safety matters, we are notifying you that Drake Public Safety has received reports of three burglaries in Drake-owned real estate properties and two incidents of suspicious activity that have occurred since November—with three occurrences during J-Term. All of these incidents involved doors that were broken or found open. These incidents have also been reported to the Des Moines Police Department, which is investigating.
While it is true that most crimes on and around our campus involving members of the Drake community are crimes of opportunity, in these recent cases we have had break-ins to unoccupied—i.e. the tenants were not home—or vacant homes. As a reminder, if you arrive at home and suspect someone has broken in, do not enter the premises, but call the Des Moines Police Department and Public Safety and wait for assistance.
If you or friends are the victim of a crime, please immediately make a report to Drake Public Safety (271-2222) and the Des Moines Police Department (911).
In addition, here are some links to helpful safety tips:
Personal Safety
Protecting Your Stuff
As a reminder, we strongly suggest that you download the Drake Guardian App and use the Safe Ride Bus for additional safety on and around campus.
—Scott Law, Public Safety
Website publish freeze, Feb. 2–4
University Communications, ITS, and the Office of Admission have been preparing new templates for top-level content management system (CMS) web pages (mainly those that can be reached directly from Drake’s homepage), including a new homepage design for www.drake.edu.
The new designs are scheduled to go live on Feb. 4. In preparation for this launch, a publishing freeze will be put in place the prior day to prepare the templates and migrate data. The CMS will still be available to make edits and prepare content as normal, but during this period, changes will not get pushed out to the live site. There will not be any downtime for the public website, only in having updates published.
This will only affect web content that is managed in the Terminal Four (T4) CMS. Other Drake sites that utilize alternate systems such as WordPress will not be effected.
The publishing freeze will begin at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 2, through 8 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 4.
If you have any questions please contact Jeremy Sievers at jeremy.sievers@drake.edu (x2795).
—Jeremy Sievers, University Communications