GSW: Good neighbor

Kendall Blanchard, Ph.D.

AMERICUS September 29, 2007 11:37 pm

— A recent article in the Times-Recorder contained a quote suggesting that one of the limitations to Americus becoming a college town was the fact that most of the faculty at Georgia Southwestern lived somewhere outside of Americus. I can understand how one might have such a perception, but the truth is that the great majority of the full-time employees at the university live in Americus or in some other part of Sumter County. According to our records, out of 246 full-time employees, 185 or 75.2 percent live in Americus. Another 11.4 percent live outside of Americus but within Sumter County. Having served as president at a university in Colorado where fewer than 40 percent of full-time employees lived in the host community, I find these numbers impressive.
Lately, there has been a lot of talk about the importance of Georgia Southwestern to the local economy. According to a recent study conducted by our School of Business Administration, the university has a $75 million annual impact on the greater Americus economy. As we grow, that number will increase significantly. So, few question or overlook our economic importance.
However, I think what is less visible but of equal importance are the social and cultural impacts the university has on Americus and Sumter County. The majority of our faculty and staff live in town. They are tax-paying, law-abiding, voting, civic-minded professionals and good citizens. They send their children to the community’s schools, attend local churches, belong to service clubs (e.g., Kiwanis, Rotary), and support numerous worthy causes. Many of them work on a volunteer basis for organizations that promote the common good.
At a meeting of community and campus leaders last spring, GSW sociologist, Tom Johnson, Ph.D., made a presentation in which he cited the multitude of contributions that the faculty and staff at the university make to the community. This list, which was long, included many highly visible activities. For example, the CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) program is co-directed by one of our faculty who is largely responsible for securing the various grant monies that keep that program operating. The Domestic Violence Resource Center is located on our campus and directed by the faculty. There are other activities such as the GSW Internship Program which provide interns at no cost to a variety of service organizations across the community. There are the theater events, musical events, athletic events, special workshops, seminars and convocations. Also, there are the less visible volunteer activities that often go unnoticed. Sam Miller, Ph.D., the vice president for Student Affairs at the university, is in charge of a regular “Community and Public Service Volunteer Report Form” and keeps track of the amount of time reported to him by GSW faculty, staff and student group volunteers. He reports that during the last academic year, the nine months from late August 2006 to the end of April 2007, GSW employees and students provided a total of approximately 15,500 volunteer hours to the greater Americus community. He suggests that this figure is probably well below the actual number since not all of the volunteer work undertaken by members of the campus community gets reported.
So, not only do the majority of GSW employees live in or near Americus, they make their presence felt by their involvement in and contributions to the larger community served by the university. In short, Georgia Southwestern is a good neighbor.

Kendall Blanchard, Ph.D., is president, Georgia Southwestern State University.