Campus News

Henderson State University’s nursing program has been ranked as one of the best in Arkansas by Registered Nursing.org.

With 26 nursing programs in the state, Henderson’s was ranked second best.

Nursing programs were assessed on several factors which represent how well a program supports students towards licensure and beyond. 

“Henderson is home to an acclaimed BSN program with a flexible fit for new, transfer, and returning nurses,” according to Registered Nursing.org’s breakdown of the state’s programs. “Mentorships and rigorous clinical training greatly assist nursing graduates in their new profession.”

For more information about Henderson’s nursing program, go hsu.edu/nursing.

Twelve Henderson State University students will vie for the title of Miss HSU 2019 at 6 p.m. February 10 in Arkansas Hall.  The pageant will feature lifestyle and fitness, evening gown, and talent competitions, and is a preliminary event for the Miss Arkansas Pageant.

The evening will also include the inaugural Miss HSU Outstanding Teen Pageant with eight contestants.

Competing for Miss HSU are:

• Anaya Nicole Hunter, a junior Spanish major from Arkadelphia

• Misty Morris, a sophomore marketing major from Texarkana, Texas

• Robin Campbell, a senior elementary educational studies major from Pine Bluff

• Cinnamon Maxwell, a senior social sciences major from Pine Bluff

• Gabriella Clayton, a freshman pre-law major from Little Rock

• Lexie Jeffords, a freshman pre-dental major from Sheridan

• Ashley Trieschmann, a senior integrated studies major from Bismarck

• Megan Skartvedt, a sophomore marketing, entrepreneurship, accounting major from Russellville

• Peyton Davis, a Freshman hospitality tourism and event planning major from Cabot

• Aiyanna Bartley, a sophomore biology, pre-med major from Atlanta, Ga.

• Dawn Coffman, a graduate mental health and school counseling major from Ashdown

• Haven Hughes, a freshman nursing major from Bryant

Outstanding teen contestants are: Blaise Batson, Arkadelphia; Charlee Lewellyn, Jonesboro; Phoebe Grace Johnson, Little Rock; Brooklyn Buford, Arkadelphia; Bailey Gibson, Hot Springs; Mollie Tiner, Stuttgart; Lexie Weatherford, Little Rock; and Mallory Sharp, Jonesboro.

Admission is $5 at the door, or free with valid HSU ID.

Entertainment will be provided by Miss HSU 2018 Jeana Lovett, Miss HSU 2017 Olivia Moore, Miss Arkansas Claudia Raffo, Miss Arkansas Outstanding Teen Camille Cathey, Kaneil Purifoy, William Tedford, and Jennifer Wright.

Ricki Rebollar, spirit coordinator for Henderson athletics and alumni relations, will serve as pageant host.

Henderson State University’s nursing department received a $140,447 grant to establish a health education simulation center on campus. The center will include new simulation equipment and professional development.

The grant was awarded to the Henderson State University Foundation by the Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas. In all, the Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas gave $2.7 million in grants for 2019 to improve health in Arkansas.

Henderson hopes to increase enrollment for its nursing programs by replacing 25-50 percent of clinical hours with simulation, which would help relieve the limitations from available clinical space.

“The increased enrollment will help alleviate the nursing shortage in our region and help us reach the goal of 80 percent BSN nurses available by 2020 as recommended by the Institute of Medicine,” said Dr. Shelley Austin, nursing department chair and assistant professor.

In spring 2018, Henderson received 57 nursing applicants for the traditional BSN program. But only 24 could be admitted.

“We had to turn away 33 qualified applicants due to lack of clinical space and lack of qualified faculty,” Austin said. “The center will enable us to increase our qualified, pre-licensure nursing students to 32 each year.”

The simulation center will be available to all health professional students at Henderson, including those seeking health-related degrees other than nursing. It will provide “real-life” experiences with guided learning scenarios in a safe, innovative environment.

“Nursing will be designated as the primary user of the HESC, but we will encourage students in our other health professional degrees to utilize it,” Austin said.

Henderson’s other health professional degrees include:

• Associate of Health Science
• Bachelor of Science in Health and Human Performance
• Bachelor of Science in Medical Technology
• Bachelor of Science in Radiography
• Bachelor of Science in Nuclear Medicine
• Associate of Radiography

Henderson just opened two new online MSN degrees: Family Nurse Practitioner and Nurse Administrator with a Nurse Educator Certificate. Students in the Family Nurse Practitioner program can utilize the center for demonstration of check-offs on physical assessment at the advanced practice level.

The majority of the grant funds will be used to acquire simulation equipment and professional development necessary to supply and sustain the center, Austin said.

“These funds will help Henderson develop a comprehensive and collaborative simulation center for regional partners and college health programs,” she said.

The center will include a Nursing Anne simulator, which is a skills proficiency full-body female mannequin built specifically for nursing education, and SimBaby Pediatric Simulator.

A grand opening is planned in May 2019, and simulation experiences will start in spring 2019.

“The nursing department at Henderson is truly grateful to the Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas for giving us this grant to develop the simulation center,” Austin said. “The center will impact not only nursing students at Henderson, but it will impact other health professionals seeking degrees at the university, and the community by providing simulation learning to the health care workers of our region.”

Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield established the Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas in 2001 as a charitable foundation to promote better health in the state. The foundation awards grants annually to non-profit or governmental organizations and programs that positively affect the health of Arkansas.

In its 17 years of operation, the Blue & You Foundation for a Healthier Arkansas has awarded $33 million to 1,566 health improvements in Arkansas.

Henderson State University will host the 2019 Arkansas Undergraduate Research Conference April 5-6.

“This is the best opportunity in Arkansas for undergraduates in all disciplines to present their research,” said Dr. David Bateman, director of undergraduate research. “Please submit your abstracts as soon as possible so we can begin planning for the distribution of posters and oral sessions.”

Registration and abstract submissions are now open. Students may begin signing up by going to https://bit.ly/2B9ZcC4.

For more information, contact Bateman at batemat@hsu.edu or 870-230-5306.

Visitors to the Feb. 1 Gallery Walk in Downtown Hot Springs will have the opportunity to create their own Sumi-Ink print at Henderson State University’s Landmark Building.

A collection of varying printmaking processes, that includes work from members of the Arkansas Society of Printmakers and Henderson State students, will be on display during the Gallery Walk from 5-8 p.m.

Henderson art professor David Warren and his students will conduct a small workshop giving visitors a hands-on experience at printmaking.

Henderson State University’s Department of Music will present its annual President’s Concert at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 2 in the Russell Fine Arts Harwood Recital Hall.  The program features student soloists selected as winners of a competition in November.

“The opportunity for some of our best students to perform solo works accompanied by an orchestra, including members of the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, is one of the highlights of our entire year,” said Dr. Steve Becraft, coordinator of the competition.

The concert will also honor Dr. Kay McAfee, retired professor of organ and music history at Henderson.

Soloists include:

• Morgan Lee, a soprano from Malvern, who will perform “Batti, batti o bel Masetto” from Mozart’s Don Giovannie.
• Luke Fields, a saxophonist from New Boston, Texas, will perform the first movement of Ibert’s Concertino da Camera.
• Zaquary Hale, a flutist from Bryant, will perform Otar Gordeli’s Concertino for Flute.

Competition judges also awarded honorable mention to Emelia Adams a hornist from Arkadelphia.

McAfee is a 1968 graduate of Henderson, and attained the advanced degrees of Masters and Doctorate at the Eastman School of Music and the University of North Texas.

She established the Mae Whipple, Robert Ellis, Wayne McAfee, and Kay McAfee Alumni Funds. The Whipple Fund has supported the President’s Concert every year.

In her professional career, McAfee performed throughout the South, was organist and pianist for numerous large choral offerings and solo recitals, and was a featured artist at American Guild of Organists (AGO) Regional Conventions. She has written articles for The Diapason, the French Organ Music Seminars to England and France, reviews of AGO conventions, and the chronicling of the history of the Central Arkansas Chapter of the AGO at its 50th anniversary.

McAfee has served as rehearsal and performance pianist for six Henderson drama department musicals since her retirement, and has served as organist for numerous Henderson choir concerts. She contributes funding for the Henderson Opera Workshop and theatre department.

In 2007, she was inducted into the Henderson Academy by her peers and colleagues in the music department, and, in 2010, was named a Distinguished Alumna of Henderson. In 2016, she and four of her former students performed an organ recital as part of the Sesquicentennial observance of Henderson.

McAfee currently serves as organist and children’s choir accompanist for First United Methodist Church of Arkadelphia.

She and her husband Wayne, a former professor of art at Henderson, have two daughters, Lee and Rachael.

The concert is free and open to the public.

For more information, contact Becraft at 230-5412 or becrafs@hsu.edu.

Henderson State University will host a Martin Luther King Jr. Community Banquet at 6 p.m. Jan. 21 in the Garrison Center Ballroom. Dr. Fitzgerald Hill, an Arkadelphia native, will be guest speaker.

Tickets are $10 each and can be purchased online at https://bit.ly/2sf109m. The event is free for students, but they must sign up online.

Hill is executive director of the Scott Ford Center for Entrepreneurship, community development, and foundation at Arkansas Baptist College.

He played football at Ouachita Baptist University, and coached for the University of Arkansas and was head football coach at San Jose State.

Artwork by Joli Livaudais will be displayed at an exhibition in the Russell Fine Arts Gallery Jan. 22-Feb. 27.

A reception and gallery talk with Livaudais will be Jan. 22 from 12-1 p.m. in the gallery.

Livaudais received her BA and MS in Experimental Psychology from the University of Texas at Arlington before establishing herself as a freelance commercial photographer in Dallas. She received her MFA from Louisiana Tech University in Ruston in 2013, and is currently an assistant professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

Her fine art photography explores both historical photographic processes and contemporary alternative methods, including gum bichromate printing, photo sculpture and installation, and incorporates her interest in both psychology and spirituality.

Livaudais’s artwork has been featured in both solo and group shows nationwide, and she was featured as a historical process gum bichromate artist in Christina Anderson’s text on the process, Gum Printing: A Step-By-Step Manual, Highlighting Artists and Their Creative Practice, published in 2016.

Fall commencement ceremonies were held at Henderson State University Friday, Dec, 14, with about 280 undergraduate and graduate students receiving their degrees.

The ceremony for School of Business and Teachers College, Henderson, began at 9 a.m. in the Wells Center gymnasium, followed at noon by the ceremony for the Ellis College of Arts and Sciences.

Faculty charges were presented by Dr. Judi Jenkins, associate professor of Educational Leadership, and Dr. Fred Worth, professor of mathematics. Student responses were given by Leslie Marie Hardage Pitman and Johanna Baker.

A section of 12th Street in Arkadelphia will be closed Dec. 17-21 to allow construction on the west end of Smith Hall on the Henderson campus. The area effected is the block between Wilson and Huddleston streets.