Faculty members will enter their fall 2020 grades using Banner. The grading window will open at 9:00 a.m. Monday, December 14, and close at 9:00 p.m. Wednesday, December 23. In preparation, faculty members are encouraged to log on to Banner to be sure that all their courses are listed under their accounts. Detailed documentation for entering grades (PDF, 191 KB) is available on Banner. Additional assistance is available by contacting the IT Help Desk at 878-4357 Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

If you have questions about grading, please call the Registrar's Office at 878-4811. We have provided a grading tip sheet (PDF, 712 KB) to assist you in successful grading.

Faculty members will enter their fall 2020 grades using Banner. In preparation, faculty members are encouraged to log on to Banner to be sure that all their courses are listed under their accounts. Detailed documentation for entering grades (PDF, 191 KB) is available on Banner. Additional assistance is available by calling the IT Help Desk at 878-4357 from 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Monday through Friday. If you have questions about grading, please call the Registrar's Office at 878-4811.

The fall 2020 faculty grading window opens Monday, December 14, at 9:00 a.m. and closes Wednesday, December 23, at 9:00 p.m.

The Civic and Community Engagement Office is pleased to present a Vote by Design Training Workshop today, September 29, from 3:00 to 4:30 p.m. This event is presented by Campus Compact as part of the Education for Democracy: Election 2020 Series and is free to members of the Buffalo State College community.

In an age of hyper-partisanship and divisive public discourse, how can we help our students engage in the upcoming elections with a posture of inquiry, empathy, and generative conversation?  

With the low youth turnout in the last presidential election, a lot of effort is being spent getting young voters to vote. But are we doing enough to help students become capable and confident voters, helping them approach their voting decisions as independent and critical thinkers? What if what shows up as “voter apathy” is really lack of clarity? 

Vote by Design is an award-winning voter literacy project incubated at Stanford University’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (d.school) that teaches voters how to view the job of the U.S. president through leadership qualities and qualifications (as opposed to sound bites or parental and peer influence). It blends critical thinking, civics literacy, and conversation across different perspectives to help voters create a more robust and personal understanding of what we’re voting for. It helps students identify potential biases in themselves and creates productive spaces for them to learn from others.

To date, Vote by Design has been offered to more than 1,000 students across the United States, from the deep red state of Montana to the deep South of Georgia and across California.

Hosted by Andrew Seligsohn, president of Campus Compact, and facilitated by Lisa Kay Solomon, designer in residence at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design and bestselling author of Moments of Impact: How to Design Strategic Conversations That Accelerate Change. 

Please register online for this webinar and for as many other presentations in the Education for Democracy: Election 2020 Series as you would like.

Faculty and staff members are invited to attend a free Virtual SUNY Faculty Development Conference, "Teaching and Learning for Student Success," October 19 to 23.

The conference is sponsored by the SUNY Faculty Development Community of Practice, which brings together educational professional development staff and faculty throughout SUNY, with a particular emphasis on teaching and learning. This group creates opportunities for staff and faculty to learn about available SUNY resources to support teaching and learning and strengthen our professional networks. The audience for the conference includes those working in faculty development roles as well as faculty. The conference theme this year is “Teaching and Learning for Student Success.”

The conference will feature a wide variety of interactive sessions each day, virtual posters with times to engage with the poster presenters, and opportunities to network online with other attendees. More information, the conference agenda, and a registration link are available on the SUNY Center for Professional Development website.

The deadline to submit applications for the SUNY B-140W Tuition Assistance Program for the 2020 fall semester is Wednesday September 30.

Staff members may apply for tuition assistance after six months of service; faculty members may apply after one semester of service. The following employees are eligible:

• Full-time Buffalo State faculty members and professional or classified employees
• Part-time or temporary Buffalo State faculty members and professional or classified employees who are employed at least half time (faculty members must teach at least two courses in the semester)
• Full-time Research Foundation employees, provided they work on the Buffalo State campus

Program funds may be used for courses at SUNY campuses only. Eligible employees may apply for a 50 percent waiver of SUNY tuition for up to two courses a semester, to a maximum of 15 credit hours an academic year. Tuition assistance is limited to regular in-state undergraduate or graduate tuition rates. The level of support may be adjusted when necessary if funding is not adequate to cover applications received.

After submitting an application, employees who decide to drop a class or find it has been covered by another source are asked to please notify Human Resource Management immediately to update their applications.

Please visit the Human Resource Management website or call 878-4821 for applications or program guidelines.

The Buffalo State College community is saddened by the death of Ronald D. Smith, professor emeritus of communication, who died September 19, 2020. Mr. Smith joined the college in 1990 and retired in 2016. He is survived by his wife, Dawn; three sons; and six grandchildren. Services will be held at a later date. More information is available online.

This semester, the Equity and Campus Diversity Office, in partnership with the Communication Department and the Burchfield Penney Art Center, will host the Beyond Boundaries: Dare to Be Diverse Film and Discussion Series virtually. We are excited to present this semester's amazing films and some very special panelists. The full calendar is available online (PDF, 681 KB).

Our September film is Warrior Women on Thursday, September 24, at 7:00 p.m. via Zoom. Registration is required; RSVP online.

Warrior Women details the story of Madonna Thunder Hawk, an American Indian Movement (AIM) leader who shaped a kindred group of activists’ children—including her daughter Marcy—into the “We Will Remember” Survival School as a Native alternative to government-run education. Together, Madonna and Marcy fought for Native rights in an environment that made them more comrades than mother and daughter. Today, with Marcy now a mother herself, both are still at the forefront of Native issues, fighting against the environmental devastation of the Dakota Access Pipeline and for Indigenous cultural values.

Please feel free to share this information widely, and please join us for this award-winning film.

The Early Undergraduate Research Opportunity (EURO) program, sponsored by the Undergraduate Research Office, is accepting micro-project funding applications for the fall 2020 semester through Monday, October 26. EURO provides lower-division students with the opportunity to participate in research and creative activities by serving as an assistant under a faculty mentor. Faculty members must identify a micro-project task (or set of tasks) to be performed within a time frame of approximately five weeks during the semester. Stipends of $500 are provided for students, with an additional $100 available for supplies. Digital projects are encouraged, and all awards are subject to prevailing COVID-19 guidelines, IRB restrictions, and funding availability. Student assistants must be classified as freshmen or sophomores with at least 12 and no more than 60 earned credit hours at the time of application.

As previously announced, Buffalo State College Information Technology is phasing out support for legacy Outlook data files—also known as Personal Folders, PST files, or Archive folders—by the end of the 2020 calendar year.

If you still use Personal or Archive folders in Outlook and wish to keep them, you must move the items stored in these folders back to your "live" mailbox before the end of the 2020 calendar year. Directions are in the IT Knowledge Base.

As previously announced, Buffalo State College Information Technology is phasing out support for legacy Outlook data files—also known as Personal Folders, PST files, or Archive folders—by the end of the 2020 calendar year.

If you still use Personal or Archive folders in Outlook and wish to keep them, you must move the items stored in these folders back to your "live" mailbox before the end of the 2020 calendar year. Directions are in the IT Knowledge Base.