Campus News – TrevEchoes Online

Admissions pushes through pandemic to bring in new students

25Feb

By Grace BecknerNo Comments

Admissions pushes through pandemic to bring in new students

Next year's freshman class is on track to surpass the numbers of the freshman who came to Trevecca in 2020. “Based on what I am seeing, it looks like the pandemic may have affected us more in the fall of 2020, than it is going to affect us in the fall of 2021,” said Melinda Miller, executive director of traditional admissions. Trevecca admissions officials say they have admitted 985 freshmen as of Monday, Feb. 22, while at the same time last year they had admitted 765 freshmen. They attribute this increase of admitted students to their test optional policy adopted for the fall of 2021. This fall, 350 freshmen and 66 transfers enrolled at Trevecca. That's about 61 fewer than the 392 freshmen and 85 transfer students in the fall of 2019, the year before Covid-19. For the coming f...

Trojan Idol night one begins this Friday

24Feb

By trevechoesonlineNo Comments

Campus News, Events

Trojan Idol night one begins this Friday

by Joshua Michel Trojan Idol is back and will take place Feb. 26 and Mar. 6, a Friday and Saturday instead of the traditional two Fridays. The competition will feature 10 contestants. “I’ve been singing since I was a little kid and have never done it competitively, though this would be the perfect setting. I thought this would be a fun way to see how far I could go,” said Thandiwe Nkomazana, a freshman communications major. Information about the event will be disseminated through the weekly SGA email, on posters and monitors around campus, and on the SGA Instagram, @tnusga. Trojan Idol is a campus-wide singing competition traditionally held yearly during the fall semester. Audience members can vote on who moves on to the finals and the overall w...

Adjustments made to spring semester plan after fall feedback

24Feb

By trevechoesonlineNo Comments

Campus News, Coronavirus

Adjustments made to spring semester plan after fall feedback

by Kaylee Franklin With the spring semester nearing the midway point and less than 100 days to go until summer break, students are feeling the weight of this pandemic school year. For Erica Wigart, associated student body president, her number one priority has been making sure that students feel heard and advocated for. “My main goal this year has just been to listen to people if they ever come to me with different concerns and just advocate for them,” said Wigart. “If I’m experiencing something a lot of other people are probably experiencing that as well.” When it came down to evaluate the efforts of the fall semester, Trevecca administrators sat down with the COVID-19 student advisory board, a focus group of students working with administr...

Students work to host modified Friday Night Live event

23Feb

By trevechoesonlineNo Comments

Campus News, Coronavirus, Events

Students work to host modified Friday Night Live event

By Isabel Landers A small group of students on campus are meeting every week to try and figure out how to still host the university's most popular social event of the year. Friday Night Live, an event based on the popular TV show Saturday Night Live, typically draws more than 200 students a year. After canceling last year's show because of COVID-19, organizers are in the process of figuring out how to host the event this year in line with restrictions on crowd gatherings. Rachel Thompson, social life director, hopes that the show is similar to how it has always been. She knows that there will be a few minor differences but thinks that from an audience perspective it will look the same. Thompson said there will still be live components and video components. Th...

Student retention holds steady despite pandemic

16Feb

By Grace BecknerNo Comments

Campus News, Coronavirus

Student retention holds steady despite pandemic

When COVID-19 sent Trevecca students and faculty scrambling to figure out online learning last spring, Megan McGhee, the director of new student programs, said student development went into crisis mode. “In the spring, I think it was all so new that, to a certain extent, we were all just trying to survive,” she said. The crisis in question? Convincing students to return to Trevecca in the fall. Jeff Swink, the coordinator of retention and assessment, defines this problem as “trying to make sure that every student is retained at the university each semester.” Across the United States, the average student retention rate at four-year institutions is 81 percent. Trevecca’s average retention rate in the past has been 87 percent. This year, largely because of the pandemic, the ...

Trevecca classes move online for winter storm

15Feb

By Naomi OverbyNo Comments

Campus News

Trevecca classes move online for winter storm

All Trevecca classes will transition online for Monday, Feb. 15 as a safety measure for the winter storm warning in effect across middle Tennessee. The announcement arrived in an email from Tom Middendorf, university provost, on Sunday night. Trevecca employees will also move online and be remote alongside students. “Travel conditions are expected to be difficult and dangerous throughout the duration of the storm. Travel is not recommended unless absolutely necessary,” Middendorf said. According to the National Weather Service for Nashville, it is expected to see three to five inches of snow and sleet. The warning will remain in effect until 6 a.m. on Tuesday. Roads could be dangerous due to low visibility and slick asphalt. Expected snow and ice forec...

29Jan

By trevechoesonlineNo Comments

Campus News, Events, Spiritual Life

Spiritual Deepening Week begins Tuesday

By Joshua Michel From Feb. 2-4, Trevecca will host a hybrid Spiritual Deepening Week. In-person services will be held on Tuesday and Wednesday. A recorded chapel session will be posted in the iAttended app on Thursday. Information regarding Spiritual Deepening Week will be distributed via the iAttended app. Last semester, videos were released every day for Spiritual Deepening Week, but the return of optional in-person chapel in the spring semester allowed for planning a mixture of physical and online. “Everyone is fatigued with video stuff. At some point it becomes the law of diminishing return. We were able to do in-person this semester, and we did not want to overdo the video stuff. The amount of content is going to be distilled, we will shrink it down and be inten...

Chapel Redesign Moves Services Across Campus, Online for Spring 2021 Semester

28Jan

By Caitlin LassiterNo Comments

Campus News, Coronavirus, Spiritual Life

Chapel Redesign Moves Services Across Campus, Online for Spring 2021 Semester

Trevecca chapel is back to meeting in-person this semester and requirements and fines will be enforced again. After a semester of no required attendance and all virtual chapels, a return to previous chapel plans and requirements is underway. Students will be required to wear masks and socially distance and the number of required chapels is 14 this semester, instead of the usual 24. Online viewing was down last semester when attendance wasn’t a requirement, so a shift back to mandatory chapel credits is necessary to get students to engage with the content on a regular basis, University Chaplain Erik Gernand said. With more than 24 options for attendance this semester, Worship & Witness chapels will be held Tuesdays at 9:30 a.m. in Boone Convocation, Benson Audito...

Alumni won’t be at Homecoming: Events planned for current students

2Nov

By trevechoesonlineNo Comments

Alumni, Campus News, Coronavirus, Events

Alumni won’t be at Homecoming: Events planned for current students

By Diana Leyva Jacob Alumni won't be able to come to the hill for homecoming this year. Instead, campus officials are planning virtual events to attempt to connect with alumni in the midst of a pandemic that makes gatherings like homecoming impossible. “I think for our emotional well-being, it is important to try to capture as much of a sense of normalcy, so that's what we hope to do by sharing these virtual events,” said Michael Johnson, director of alumni and church engagement. An online kit is available for $25, which includes access to the virtual live stream, a Trevecca mask and t-shirt, candy, and popcorn. Ten dollars from each purchase will go towards the Fund for Trevecca Scholarship. While university officials aren't allowing anyone on campus other tha...

31Oct

By Grace BecknerNo Comments

Campus News

Student led podcast to focus on fostering communication on campus

Allie Tooley and Kennedy Crider laugh and bicker back and forth as they brainstorm possible names for their podcast--a shared dream that has been several years in the making. “Kennedy had this dream for a podcast that she had been talking about for a while, but it just kind of got to the point where we thought, ‘why don’t we just do it?’” said Tooley. Crider lovingly referred to the project as her “four-year frustration.” Podcast cover artwork, provided by Tooley and Crider. The podcast, which was eventually named “Loose Leaf Tea & You with Kennedy and Allie,” is meant to be a means of conversation and communication between the Trevecca students to the administration and faculty. “We want to have a space for conversation where people from ...