{"id":4923,"date":"2017-08-18T09:50:02","date_gmt":"2017-08-18T13:50:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/?p=4923"},"modified":"2025-08-13T19:33:43","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T23:33:43","slug":"currently-trending-on-twitter-umpi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/2017\/08\/18\/currently-trending-on-twitter-umpi\/","title":{"rendered":"Currently Trending on Twitter: UMPI"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nOn behalf of the University of Maine at Presque Isle, it is my great pleasure to welcome all of you–new and returning students, community members, faculty and staff (old and new!)–to the start of the 2017-2018 academic year.<\/p>\n

This is a particularly exciting time to be an Owl (hoot hoot!).\u00a0 Just this past year alone, we received kudos from national organizations for our academic and programmatic excellence, from appearing in \u201cU.S. News and World Report\u2019s\u201d top regional public schools in the northeast, to ranking in \u201cForbes\u201d magazine\u2019s \u201cbest value\u201d list.\u00a0 We also received a Best Value School Award, recognition for providing students with among the lowest debt upon graduation of any schools in the Northeast, outstanding service to our veterans through the Yellow Ribbon program, and exemplary ranking for several of our accredited programs, including Education, Medical Laboratory Technician, Social Work and Athletic Training.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of new faces are joining us this year, both in person and on-line, in our university classrooms as well as our early college courses in high schools across Aroostook County and beyond.\u00a0 We\u2019re also welcoming new staff and faculty to the UMPI Owl family to teach, mentor and support our students.\u00a0 We have many new initiatives starting up to better guide students\u2019 professional and academic achievement.\u00a0 These include our Campus to Career Program, directed by Nicole Fournier (nicole.fournier@maine.edu<\/a>), that through EPortfolio, experiential learning, advising and career preparation assists students in actively developing the post-college outcomes that they desire.\u00a0 We are increasing our focus on transformational experiences such as internships in all of all majors and increased academic support services and programming. We are also emphasizing clearly articulated learning goals for each course you take in every program, so that you know what<\/em> you need to know and when<\/em> you need to know it.\u00a0 Finally, we\u2019re starting our \u201cFinish in 4\u201d initiative, to help ensure that all students know their personal pathways, from their first day on campus to their last, to finishing their degree in four years or less.<\/p>\n

As of this September, I\u2019ve spent 20 years at UMPI and filled more roles than I can sometimes keep track of\u2014from professor to advisor to chair to vice president to provost and now president.\u00a0 Much has changed over the course of those years. Frankly, we\u2019ve learned a lot as an institution, and there are many things that I believe we do better now than we did back in 1997.<\/p>\n

But much at UMPI\u2014especially our values as an institution\u2014have remained consistent.\u00a0 Faculty knew then, as they do now, that college students who connect both inside and outside the classroom are more likely to achieve a higher degree of success in both their professional and personal lives.\u00a0 UMPI then, as now, strove to provide outstanding opportunities to challenge you intellectually and expand your cultural and cognitive comfort zone in preparation for the world that follows.\u00a0 In addition, co-curricular experiences and hands-on learning\u2014from internships and study abroad programs to research opportunities and experiential learning, to conferences and distinguished lectures\u2014were recognized as critical to student success.<\/p>\n

In the past several years, UMPI began the process of transforming itself beyond a state university that provided northern Mainers with an excellent education. It began its journey as a nationally recognized leader in education which, simply put, was determined to guarantee that all of its students, regardless of their major, would be ready for professional or graduate careers.\u00a0 It was determined that all students, regardless of discipline, would be guaranteed to have mastered all of the skills and knowledge necessary for success in today\u2019s world.\u00a0 We call this \u201cpersonalized education,\u201d in which you, as students, have multiple opportunities and venues to show your mastery of subject matter, receive the support you need to achieve that mastery and are provided a guaranteed pathway to complete your undergraduate degree in four years (or less!).\u00a0 And over these past four years, UMPI has received more and more recognition from around the country.\u00a0 And we\u2019ve only begun this particular phase of our journey!<\/p>\n

One more thing that hasn\u2019t changed: success in college remains a partnership between the university and you, its students.\u00a0 For our faculty and dedicated staff members are only as effective as the relationships that they develop with you and that you, in turn, develop with them.\u00a0 As president, I am often asked what advice I have to offer new students.\u00a0 Much of it seems like \u201ccommon sense\u201d: (1) Go to class. (2) Get involved, inside and outside your classes. (3) Get to know and make friends with people ahead of you in your program. (4) Learn how to balance and prioritize. (5) Ask for help early and as often as necessary.\u00a0 But some may seem less so.\u00a0 Such as: (1) Don\u2019t be afraid <\/strong>of mistakes but rather learn<\/strong> from them. (2) Keep in touch with family and old friends, as they are the ones who often know you best and can keep you grounded as you face new challenges. And (3) get to understand how college \u201cworks,\u201d identifying both strengths and weaknesses for you.\u00a0 Perhaps most important of all: push yourself outside of your comfort zone, as that\u2019s often when the most powerful learning happens.\u00a0 UMPI\u2019s personalized education is designed to give you the opportunity to take risks, to not have to get everything right that first time out, but rather to develop your skills and abilities over time. That\u2019s all because, since we started doing this work back in 1903, we\u2019ve learned a few things ourselves.\u00a0 Like guaranteeing that you\u2019ll end your journey with us prepared for what comes next\u2026no matter where and how that journey began.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On behalf of the University of Maine at Presque Isle, it is my great pleasure to welcome all of you–new and returning students, community members, faculty and staff (old and new!)–to the start of the 2017-2018 academic year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":218,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7381],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archives","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/218"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4923"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4923\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8801,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4923\/revisions\/8801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}