FHSU University Relations

Eight alumni and friends of Fort Hays State University will be honored at the Alumni Awards and Recognition Banquet on Oct. 11 during 2019 Homecoming weekend.

This year’s four Alumni Achievement Award recipients are Buck Arnhold ’74, ’76, ’80, Olathe; Kevin Faulkner ’83, ’83, Pebble Beach, Calif.; Dr. Leigh (Bunn) Goodson ’94, Tulsa, Okla.; and Michael Miller ’85, ’86, ’93, Kansas City, Mo.

The Alumni Achievement Award, the association’s highest honor, was established in 1959 to recognize graduates who have made outstanding and unselfish contributions in service to their community, state or nation as citizens, in chosen career fields or through philanthropic work. The award is based upon career and professional achievements, service involving community betterment, philanthropic activities and educational achievements.

The Young Alumni Award will go to two recipients: Cole Engel, Ph.D., CPA, ’07, ’07, ’09, Hays; and Joshua W. Snider ’05, El Paso, Texas.

The Young Alumni Award is granted to graduates of 10- through 15-year reunion classes. The award is designed to recognize those early in their careers who have had outstanding professional and educational achievements, community activities, honors and awards received, and other accomplishments since graduation. Candidates must hold a bachelor’s degree from FHSU, be members of the 10-15 reunion classes, and be under age 40 as of Jan. 1 of the year the awards are presented.

This year’s Distinguished Service Award goes to Dr. Christie (Patterson) Brungardt ’01 and
Dr. Curt Brungardt ’81, ’84 of Council Grove.

The Distinguished Service Award recognizes a graduate or friend of the university who has demonstrated a continuing concern for humanity on a universal, national, state or community level, who supports spiritual, cultural and educational objectives, and who endorses and exemplifies the highest standards of character and personal attributes. It is reserved for alumni or friends of the university.

ALUMNI ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS
Buck Arnhold
After 40 years as a full-time professional artist and entrepreneur, Buck Arnhold is still actively creating. Upon completing his B.A., M.A. and M.F.A. from Fort Hays State, he launched his own successful sign and graphics business in Hays. He painted Bob Dole’s presidential announcement backdrop and murals for many organizations and schools including FHSU’s Forsyth Library.

In 1989 he relocated to Kansas City where he worked for Acme Sign Company with clients such as the Kansas City Chiefs and Boulevard Brewing Company. For the latter, he painted the iconic smokestacks which have been recreated as tap handles found in establishments across the region. During this time, he also produced works for the personal foundations of former Chiefs players including Derrick Thomas, Joe Montana and Marcus Allen.

Among many other high-flying art projects, Buck’s job required him to repaint the Chiefs’ Arrowhead sign atop the stadium by being hoisted 100 feet up in the air on a boom truck and, still not reaching the sign, swinging another 15 feet on a wooden seat hung with ropes, a five-gallon bucket of paint, a roller and a brush.

Always generous to share both his art and his knowledge, he has painted murals in El Salvador and designed décor, paintings and murals for countless fundraisers. He has been especially generous to Literacy Kansas City and The Good Samaritan Project, among others.

He has also painted murals in 28 of the 36 Olathe elementary schools. Arnhold has provided annual drawing demonstrations for elementary students hoping to engage and inspire youth in the artistic process. In 1998 he went to work for Associated Wholesale Grocers, where he was responsible for 1,500 murals and art in 22 states.

Kevin Faulkner
When Kevin Faulkner graduated from FHSU in 1983, he was already a very committed Tiger who showed great potential. He earned two B.A.s, one in political science and another economics, served as SGA president, received the Torch Award, and continued his education at the University of Virginia Law School, where he earned a Juris Doctorate.

Faulkner has succeeded at the highest level in his professional career, most of which has been spent while working as an investor relations officer (IRO) for various technology companies in Silicon Valley.

After 12 years as a securities and corporate lawyer with two prestigious West Coast firms, he embarked upon a career in investor relations that revolutionized that role for technology companies from an administrative position supporting the CEO and CFO to an outward-facing position working directly with investors while ensuring that all securities regulations and insider trading laws are followed.

Faulkner has been a generous supporter of Fort Hays State University through the FHSU Foundation and the FHSU entrepreneurship program. While serving since 2010 on the Foundation Board of Trustees Investment Committee and Executive Committee, he led efforts to improve the Foundation’s investment goals and strategy, which created many millions more in returns than the former strategy would have generated.

He has championed FHSU’s W.R. and Yvonne Robbins College of Business and Entrepreneurship by providing resources to the entrepreneurship program, serving as a judge and supporter for the Faulkner Challenge entrepreneur competition, and developing support from local business leaders, regional economic development officials and potential investors.

Dr. Leigh Goodson
As a highly energetic advocate of education and community service, Dr. Leigh (Bunn) Goodson has risen through the educational ranks and is currently the president of Tulsa Community College. The foundation for Leigh’s stellar career achievements can be traced back to her experience as an admissions counselor for FHSU, a position she held while she completed work on a Master of Science degree in organizational communication. Her focus, then and now, is on students and helping change their economic trajectories.

Tulsa Community College is recognized as a nationally prominent urban community college that annually serves 27,000-plus students at four Tulsa metro campuses and two community campuses.

Under her leadership, TCC was selected as one of 30 colleges nationwide to participate in the Pathways Project, a program sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Through the Pathways program and with a significant financial commitment from the college and private funders, TCC was able to increase support services to help students graduate.

Those practices have transformed the college. Results include increased retention rates, an increased number of students taking full-time class loads, allowing developmental education students to access college-level classes quicker, and higher retention rates for students of color.

Prior to assuming the TCC presidency in 2014, Goodson served as vice president for research and institutional advancement at the Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences, where she administered $30 million in grants and contracts and directed all federal government relations for both OSU campuses in Tulsa.

Her service includes membership on the Oklahoma State Chamber of Commerce Board, the Tulsa World Community Advisory Board, the Tulsa Area United Way Campaign, the YMCA of Greater Tulsa Metropolitan Board of Directors and the Tulsa Public Schools Board of Education, among others.

Michael Miller
Mike Miller earned several degrees from FHSU, including an A.S. in radiologic technology in 1985, a B.S. in general science in 1986 and an M.S. in physical education in 1993. After serving FHSU as a clinical instructor of radiology, he left to pursue his life-long dream of following in his father’s footsteps and becoming an agent for the FBI.

Miller earned his FBI special agent certification at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va. Since 1998, he has served in many roles, most recently as a training coordinator and special agent for the FBI in Kansas City. Early in his FBI career, he obtained a conviction in a $28 million Medicare fraud scheme. After the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Miller was deployed to New York on two occasions. During the first, he was a member of the response team that recovered a weaponized anthrax-laced letter sent to the New York Post. On his second deployment, he worked to search for, recover and document evidence and human remains from Ground Zero rubble.

He has received multiple awards for his FBI work in a variety of cases, including preventing violence against Westboro Baptist Church members and counter-protestors, recovery of the newborn baby of Bobbi Jo Stinnett, and coordination of searches and testimony in a plot to attack a mosque in Southwest Kansas.

As the Topeka Jewish community became more concerned about dangers from shooters and other threats, Miller became instrumental to the Beth Shalom temple.

YOUNG ALUMNI AWARD
Dr. Cole Engel
A lifelong FHSU Tiger, Dr. Cole Engel, CPA, earned two undergraduate degrees in 2007, B.B.A.s in computer information systems and accounting from Fort Hays State. He also earned an MBA in accounting from FHSU in 2009, and later became a licensed CPA. During graduate school, he served as a graduate teaching assistant. He credits that experience with molding his career path as a university professor.

Engel has been an instructor of accounting since 2009. After receiving his Ph.D. from Northcentral University in 2016, he was advanced to the rank of assistant professor of economics, finance and accounting. He has written multiple research articles for peer-reviewed publications.

During his 10 years teaching at FHSU, Engel has twice earned the Outstanding COBE Faculty Award. His work in academic advising has been recognized nationally by NACADA, the global community for academic advising as well as on-campus with the Edmund Shearer and Navigator Awards.

His most extensive and long-term community-service activity has been with the Internal Revenue Service’s Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program. He started as a student volunteer and is now the faculty supervisor who works with student preparers. The program annually provides free tax assistance to more than 150 low-to-middle-income, local taxpayers who need help completing their tax returns.

Along with providing professional service-learning experiences for his students, leadership on the Boy Scouts of America Eagle Scout boards of review, and support for other non-profit community organizations, Engel is a member of the FHSU Foundation Board of Trustees and serves on its Audit Committee. He created a named scholarship with the FHSU Foundation for undergraduate accounting students.

Joshua W. Snider
Completing his B.A. in political science, in 2005, and his Juris Doctorate, from Texas Tech University School of Law in 2008, Joshua Snider has become a shining star of Texas and FHSU for his tremendous impact on the U.S./Mexico border region.

He currently is a managing shareholder and attorney for Gordon Davis Johnson and Shane P.C., a business boutique firm in El Paso, Texas. He is licensed in Texas and New Mexico and admitted to practice before the U.S. Tax Court and the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. He served as an advisory member of the State Bar of Texas’ Professionalism Committee in 2014-2015.

Snider’s work includes inbound and outbound business transactions, with an emphasis on cross-border issues in Mexico, international tax planning and compliance, multinational joint ventures, complex international structures, wealth planning for high-net-worth individuals, international estate planning and a wide range of domestic and transactional tax and corporate matters.

His community service includes serving on the board and pro-bono legal counsel of the FEMAP Foundation, a multinational non-profit that raises funds to assist El Paso’s sister city, Ciudad Juarez, and its citizens to improve the quality of life through health services, education, research, and economic and social empowerment. The foundation primarily assists with funding for the Hospital de la Familia and its nursing school.

Snider formerly served on the Millennial Advisory Board for the Hospitals of Providence System, and on the board for the El Paso Chapter of March of Dimes. Josh also has provided pro bono legal services to families in need.

DISTINGUISHED SERVICE AWARD
Dr. Curt Brungardt and Dr. Christie Brungardt
The Distinguished Service Award could have been designed with Drs. Curt and Christie (Patterson) Brungardt in mind. Both are FHSU alumni and longtime faculty members in the Department of Leadership Studies, of which Curt Brungardt was the founding department chair. Upon their recent retirement, they were awarded emeritus faculty status for their service to the university.

The curriculum of the Leadership Studies Department, with 18 full-time faculty and nearly 1,700 students worldwide, is focused on citizenship and creating citizen leaders. Its methodology emphasizes service-learning and civic engagement. They have described the impetus for their work as: “We have committed our lives to be social entrepreneurs.”

They created the Center for Civic Leadership to expand civic engagement opportunities to all FHSU students and staff. The Center’s projects include the American Democracy Project; Tigers in Service; the Kansas Youth Leadership Academy; and the Benjamin Franklin Papers learning experience for K-12 students.

The Women’s Leadership Project, founded by Christie Brungardt, was created to “educate, inspire and empower women to be the leaders of tomorrow.” The Red Flag Campaign is an initiative of the WLP to educate students to recognize the warning signs of dating violence.

Red Flag was implemented from a separate, highly personal project. The Brungardts founded Jana’s Campaign, a national nonprofit organization, as a result of a deeply personal tragedy, the murder of their 25-year-old daughter, Jana Mackey. Jana’s Campaign was created “with the single purpose of reducing gender and relationship violence.” The campaign has so far been carried to more than 600 middle and high schools and 400 colleges and universities in 38 states.

LAWRENCE — This fall, the Kansas Honor Scholar Program, a longstanding tradition of the University of Kansas Alumni Association and KU Endowment, will honor more than 3,600 high school seniors throughout Kansas for their academic excellence and achievement.

Since 1971 the program has honored more than 140,000 high school seniors — from all 105 Kansas counties and approximately 360 high schools — for ranking academically in the top 10 percent of their class. The program is made possible by KU Endowment, alumni donations and proceeds from the Alumni Association’s Jayhawk license plate program, and allows the University and the Alumni Association to create more scholarship opportunities for Kansas students.

This year, the Association and KU’s Office of Admissions and Scholarships awarded five incoming freshmen from Garden City, Kansas City, Liberal, Topeka and Winfield one-time, $1,000 Kansas Honor Scholar Scholarships, funded entirely by alumni donations. In addition, two students, from Salina and Kansas City, received the $1,000 renewable four-year Herbert Rucker Woodward Scholarship, given annually for the past 21 years to Kansas Honor Scholars. Since 1985, more than 17,000 Kansas Honor Scholars have attended KU.

Scholars and their families are invited to attend any of the 13 regional ceremonies:

Garden City, Oct. 9
Manhattan, Oct. 14
Hays, Oct. 22
Wichita, Oct. 23
Wichita, Oct. 28
Colby, Oct. 29
Emporia, Nov. 4
Salina, Nov. 6
Hutchinson, Nov. 7
Lawrence, Nov. 11
Topeka, Nov. 12
Pittsburg, Nov. 13
Kansas City, Nov. 20

Ceremonies will include speakers, recognition of the scholars, and a reception for scholars, families, school administrators and alumni. During the ceremony, students will receive distinctive Kansas Honor Scholar medallions that can be worn at their local graduations or recognition events. In addition, the Alumni Association will mail certificates to all high schools for distribution to all 3,600 Kansas Honor Scholars. For more information and to register online, visit kualumni.org/khs.

Northwest Kansas students earning the honor are below:

 

 

Rain changing over to snow possible on Thursday Night with a killing freeze over much of the area by early Friday morning. #kswx pic.twitter.com/Wd4iet5KYc

— NWS Dodge City (@NWSDodgeCity) October 9, 2019

The National Weather Service has issued a freeze watch in effect from Thursday evening through Friday morning.

Forecasters are calling for a radical change in the weather, with temperatures going from a high of near 80 degrees on Wednesday to as low as 24 degrees overnight Thursday.

The freeze watch include most of western Kansas, including Hays and Ellis County.

The NWS said a freeze could kill crops and sensitive vegetation, as well as damage outdoor plumbing, reminded residents to unhook hoses from spigots to prevent damage. The NWS further warned those with in-ground sprinkler systems should drain the system and cover above-ground pipes to avoid them from freezing.

There is also a chance for precipitation as the front rolls in, with the NWS predicting a 40 percent chance of rain and possibly snow.

The temperature will rebound somewhat Saturday and Sunday, with highs in the low 60s, but overnight lows still could dip below freezing.

RUSSELL COUNTY — One person was injured in an accident just before 3:30 a.m. Wednesday in Russell County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 1996 Dodge Ram driven by James Thomas Bond, 51, Edna, was eastbound on Interstate 70 just west of the Dorrance exit.

The driver failed to move left for the construction zone, the KHP said. The pickup struck the KDOT arrow sign, traveled through the south ditch and KDOT fence and came to rest on the south side of Old U.S. 40.

EMS transported Bond to the hospital in Russell. He was not wearing a seat belt, according to the KHP.

By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

The 17-month, $28.4 million project to rebuild and upgrade the Hays wastewater treatment plant is complete.

Hays city commissioners will hear a final report during their meeting Thursday. Earlier in the day they’ll tour the reconstructed facility at 755 General Custer along with Kansas Department of Health and Environment representatives.

Work on the plant, formally known as Chetolah Creek Water Reclamation and Reuse Facility, began in May 2017 in order to meet future effluent requirements mandated by KDHE and the EPA.

Throughout the project, representatives of HDR Engineers, the city’s owner’s representative, has presented regular progress updates to the commission.

In other business, Jesse Rohr, public works director, will discuss the Ellis County floodplain remapping project.

The Kansas Division of Water Resources (DWR) and FEMA began the project in February, 2018, to update the 1986 maps currently in use.

According to Rohr the new Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) are expected to be at least 10 times more accurate and will utilize digital tools when evaluating properties for flooding risk.

Draft maps will be available for public feedback during an open house  2 p.m. to 7 p.m. Nov. 6 at Sternberg Museum.

After approval, the final floodplain maps are scheduled to become effective by the summer of 2021.

The complete Oct. 10 agenda is available here. The meeting starts at 6:30 p.m. in Hays City Hall, 1507 Main.

 

 

 

By DIANE GASPER-O’BRIEN
FHSU University Relations and Marketing

Holidays and Fort Hays State University sporting events are nearly one and the same for the Mark and Patti (Covington) Griffin family.

Avid sports fans, the Griffins have worked at their alma mater for 31 years. Their two sons virtually grew up on campus and began attending Tiger sporting events and other campus activities from the time they were babies.

While Homecoming is one of those events where both sides of their families usually meet up, Homecoming 2019 will have a special twist to it.

The Covington/Griffin family has been named Honorary Alumni Family of the Year for 2019. The distinction, in its third year, is sponsored by the FHSU Alumni Association.

About 25 family members, ranging from 2 to 81 years, are expected to ride in the 11 a.m. parade down Main Street Saturday on a trailer behind the university car carrying FHSU President Tisa Mason.

“I am really looking forward to it,” said Dixie Covington, Patti’s mother, who lives in Galva with her husband, Don. “Oktoberfest, the parade, tailgating, everything.”

Nearly 40 members of Mark’s and Patti’s extended family have attended FHSU, including their sons, Thayne and Kellen.

Thayne took some classes at FHSU while in high school but opted for a career in actuarial science and graduated from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. However, his wife, the former Kristen Fleharty, is an FHSU grad. They plan to come to Hays for the weekend and celebrate with their 2-year-old son, Parker.

“He still considers himself a Tiger,” Patti said of her oldest son, whose wedding was held in the Fort Hays State quad. When Thayne was in college at Drake, he often made the three-hour drive to Kansas City to watch the FHSU basketball teams in the MIAA tournament.

Both Kellen and his wife, Quillen (Eichhorn), are Fort Hays State alumni. And all three of Patti’s siblings and their spouses earned degrees from FHSU.

The ones who started it all more than 60 years ago will be present for the weekend festivities. In fact, Stan and Neva Griffin called off a trip to Tennessee when they learned their family was being honored this weekend.

Stan and Neva were high school sweethearts in Bunker Hill. After graduating in a class of seven in 1956, they came to Fort Hays State to further their education when their principal, Elmer Dougherty – also a successful farmer in the area – paid their tuition for the first year.

Stan chuckles when thinking about the cost of tuition back then: $55 a semester. It was the jump start he needed to get a college education. The couple was married in 1957, and Neva decided to join the workforce so Stan could finish his degree in teacher education.

After several years in the education field, Stan landed a position as manager of the computer center at a bank in Kansas City. He worked there for 32 years before retiring in 1999.

All the while, Stan and Neva have remained involved with Fort Hays State. Stan served on the board of directors for the Alumni Association for four years, and the couple regularly attends alumni events in the Kansas City area.

“I have a buddy who graduated from Pittsburg State, but I’ve converted him to a Fort Hays State fan,” Stan says proudly.

Patti’s dad is a retired Southern Baptist minister, so her family moved around a lot during her grade school days.

After graduating from Northern Valley High School in 1983, Patti followed her older sister, Pam, to Fort Hays State. Mark chose FHSU mostly because his cousins Ken and Kevin Shaffer had made the decision earlier. Both Ken and Kevin are alums.

He also liked the wide open spaces and has fond memories of making trips from Kansas City to Bunker Hill and Russell to visit relatives while growing up.

“I have always loved the country more than the city,” Mark said. “I love going back to KC to visit, but I sure like living out here.”

Both Mark and Patti were involved with intramurals as FHSU students and actually met on the softball fields. The gal from the tiny town of Almena and the city boy from Kansas City married in 1987, a week after their FHSU graduation.

“The rest, I guess,” Mark said, “is history.”

That strong FHSU family tradition proved to be just getting started.

To date, 34 FHSU degrees have been earned by family members, including numerous first cousins and their spouses.

Mark graduated with a degree in computer information systems, and Patti’s bachelor’s was in communication.

They moved to the Kansas City area after graduation but returned to Hays a year later when Mark was offered a job as a system administrator in FHSU’s computing center.

The Griffins were so excited about returning to their alma mater that when the phone call came to offer Mark the position, Patti answered and accepted the job for Mark.

“I’d lived a lot of places during my lifetime,” she said. “I was eager to get back to Hays, closer to family. And I knew Fort Hays State would be a great place to work.”

Patti took a temporary job on campus and began work on her master’s. She then earned her Ph.D. from Kansas State University and soon afterward was hired as the first director of academic advising at FHSU, a position she has held ever since. She is also an associate professor of communication studies.

Mark continued to advance in the computing center and now is assistant vice president and chief information officer for Technology Services. He also is a familiar face in other campus arenas. After volunteering to help run the scoreboard at a Tiger football game back in 1988, the job was his permanently. He runs the shot clock for FHSU basketball games as well.

Patti has also been involved with numerous activities, including advisor for Tiger Wild, member and president of the University Athletic Association and a board member for academic advising networks on the state, regional and global levels.

Both have served as co-chairs for the FHSU Foundation Campus Drive and volunteer for various events on campus.

Kellen said he has fond memories of Fort Hays State, dating all the way back to childhood when he often would come to campus after school and hang out in his parents’ offices.

Along about his junior year in high school, Kellen decided he wanted to become a teacher. He knew the perfect place to pursue an education degree.

“The education program at Fort Hays State is phenomenal,” said Kellen, now a math teacher at Shawnee Heights High School east of Topeka. “So it was the perfect place to be.”

It still is. Kellen is working on his master’s in mathematics education through FHSU’s Virtual College and on-campus classes during the summer months.

The Griffins have seen a lot of change at Fort Hays State through four decades, but the constant is the people.

“Good, solid, Fort Hays State people,” Mark started slowly, then paused when he got choked up.

“You hear people use the word family a lot when they are talking about Fort Hays State,” he said. “But it’s true. This really is a family.”

BY JONATHAN ZWEYGARDT
Hays Post

Ellis County Public Works crews are looking into how to improve the condition of the Ellis Blacktop, or 120th Avenue south of Ellis.

Public Works Director Bill Ring told the county commission Monday the 5 miles at the south end of the road are in poor condition and are getting worse.

“It’s pushing out on the sides in areas,” Ring said. “The problem with a road that old and that wore out is you can’t just put patch on it anymore.”

Ring said they have talked about repairing it in the past and believe there is only two options. The first would be to repave the road, but that would be extremely expensive, he said.

Ring said paving it again “would be probably a multi-million dollar expense which neither the county nor the Public Works Department feels would be a viable thing to do.”

The less expensive option would be to taking the road back to the rock and gravel base like many of the county roads are now.

Ring said he had a contractor give him an estimate as to what it would cost to mill a portion of the road and mix it back down with rock. The contractor’s estimate was more than $100,000, not include the county’s expenses.

“That’s not a projected expense in this year’s budget,” Ring said. “We could look at the budget deeper to see where we may be able to possibly move some money over.”

According to a traffic count done in April by the Kansas Department of Transportation, approximately 138 vehicles travel the road per day. Ring said it has remained nearly the same for the past five traffic counts.

The road goes back to dirt and sand at the Rush and Ness County line.

Ellis County Commissioner Dustin Roths said it could be dangerous with the way it turns from the asphalt surface to dirt and sand.

He also questioned why it was paved as far south as it is.

“It’s one of those where I wonder why the heck we have a paved road that far out in the middle of nowhere that we have to take care of,” Roths said. “I don’t think multiple million (of) dollars are in our future to try and fix that problem.”

Commissioner Dean Haselhorst said he was contacted about the condition of the road over the weekend. Later that day, that person’s daughter was involved in a rollover accident on 120th just south of Munjor Road. The girl was briefly hospitalized but did not suffer any injuries.

Ring said that accident occurred north of the area that is in disrepair.

CLARIFICATION: The mother of the accident victim told Hays Post on Wednesday that the contact with the commissioner was made earlier in the week, and clarified that the accident was not caused by road conditions.

Public Works crew recently worked to improve that area and a couple of miles just to the south of the town of Ellis.

The commission instructed Ring to look for what the best options would be to improve the road condition and come back to the commission.

In other business, the commission:

• Heard a legislative update from State Sen. Rick Billinger, R-Goodland, and State Rep. Barbara Wasinger, R-Hays.

• Approved the reclassification of a pair of positions within the Register of Deeds office.

• Approved the sale of an extra spray truck to Osborne County and approved a revision of the personnel policy.

ELLIS — The Ellis Community Cleanup will be held Monday with one sweep through the city. Employees will spend 15 minutes at each residence.

Unwanted items may be placed outdoors for pickup beginning Friday.

— City of Ellis