Welcome back to the Campus!
Extensive planning and preparation are ongoing as SNU works to ready the campus for the return of students in just a few days. With New Student Institute slated to begin on August 8th, the faculty and staff are working hard to ensure that our students and their families will have confidence in the university’s preparedness for the return to campus, with the assurance that everything possible is being done to make SNU the healthiest environment it can be.
SNU’s Operational Plans will continue to be based on guidance from public health officials as well as federal, state, and local government as the campus opens for in-person classes and co-curricular activities, as well as residential life.
Some of the key points in planning are social distancing, sanitation, mindfulness, hand washing, health center testing, contact tracing and personal protective equipment. The academic calendar has been built around containment and concentration of instruction days to limit extensive exposure risks.
SNU’s planning is rooted in its faith commitments: hospitality, graciousness, kindness, responsibility and others focused. The plan is built to be nimble – the university can, and will, make adjustments as circumstances dictate.
View the current plan for 2020-2021 On-Site Instruction and Activities
Frequently asked questions about SNU and COVID-19
COVID-19 Survey – Pastors Respond to the Challenge
In May of 2020, the churches in the nation were being challenged to reopen for worship and given some guidelines for doing so. During that time, the Resource Center for Pastoral Leadership at SNU (RCPL) was seeking to better understand how COVID-19 had, and is, affecting the Nazarene congregations on the South Central Field. To that end, a survey was executed for the purpose of gaining a sample of Nazarene pastors and churches to collect information from a group who represented a range of circumstances, experience, congregation size and varying challenges as front-line ministers.
The RCPL is grateful to Church of the Nazarene researcher, Dr. Kenneth Crow, for his contribution as primary consultant.
The RCPL was founded in 2013 under the auspices of SNU’s then-president Dr. Loren P. Gresham, who named Dr. Stan Toler its Founding, Executive Director. Dr. Toler, a best-selling author, leadership expert and General Superintendent Emeritus, led the RCPL from 2013 until his untimely passing in November 2017.
Dr. Terry Toler Retires: Two Decades of Service to SNU and the South Central Region
This month marked the closing chapter of a twenty-year story of ministry to the Church that was lovingly built and nurtured by SNU’s long-time Vice President of Church Relations, Dr. Terry N. Toler. His innovative nature, communication skills, leadership abilities and genuine love of people has connected the congregations on the South Central Region and countless friends to SNU in lasting ways. The announcement of his plan to retire brought scores of tributes, accolades and messages of well wishes from friends and leaders from across the nation. The Summer issue of the SNU 1899 online magazine featured a tribute to Toler’s impact and legacy of service to the university and Church.
Dr. Toler said of his time as the Church Relations leader at SNU:
What an honor it has been to live out my calling as an ordained minister of the Gospel; first as a pastor for twenty-five years and then through the work of the church in higher education these past twenty years at SNU. During these years, it has been my responsibility and privilege to face the church and speak on behalf of the University, and to sit with the senior leadership of the University and speak on behalf of the church.
While I have had many and varied administrative roles over the years, my work with the 650 churches, District Superintendents, Pastors, Associates and the laity has been one of pure joy. Perhaps no one has had the granular view of the South Central Region Church of the Nazarene in the four-state area of Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas as I have had for such a long period of time. Though I have witnessed many changes over the last two decades at SNU and on the South Central Region wherever I have traveled from Denver City, Texas in the west to Slidell, Louisiana in the east and from Miami, Oklahoma in the north or to Brownsville, Texas in the south, I found Nazarenes who love their regional University and support SNU’s commitment to fulfill her mission of making Christlike disciples through higher education. The faithful support of the University through stewardship, prayer and advocacy with prospective students is the primary reason for my optimism about the future of SNU; its persistence and success.
So, I give thanks to God for SNU and the Church of the Nazarene, and leave my official service at SNU with great gratitude for Dr. Loren Gresham, Dr. Keith Newman and the SNU Board of Trustees for trusting me with this incredible assignment. I will always be an Ambassador and Advocate for SNU wherever I go, as long as I live. GO STORM!
Terry N. Toler