Archive for July, 2024

Please join us for a farewell reception honoring Stephen Rektenwald as he embarks on his new journey with the ministry staff at Oldham Lane Church of Christ. Let’s celebrate Stephen’s contributions and wish him well in his new role. The reception will be held on Wednesday, August 7, 2024 from 1:30 PM – 3:00 PM with a special presentation at 2:00 PM in the Creative and Academic Technology office, Brown Library 326. Light refreshments will be served. We look forward to seeing you there as we show our appreciation and support for Stephen!

The retirement reception for Gayla Herrington will be held in the Lower Rotunda in the Onstead-Packer Bible Building on Thursday, August 8 from 4 PM-6 PM.

The Parade of Flags is a celebrated part of Opening Assembly on the first day of classes each fall. In this exciting ACU tradition, current students and/or employees are invited to carry flags representing their home states and countries. We need your help to ensure every state, territory, country and province of the ACU family is represented in the procession. If you are interested in participating in this year’s Opening Assembly on August 26th, please send a message to acuevents@groupmail.acu.edu. Be sure to include your name, email address and the flag you would like to carry. Flags are assigned on a first-come basis, so reach out today!

The ACU Faulkner Center for Marriage and Family is pleased to announce our fall fundraiser dinner with speaker, Tish Harrison Warren. Tish is the author of Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life (Christianity Today’s 2018 Book of the Year) and Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work, or Watch, or Weep (Christianity Today’s 2022 Book of the Year and the 2022 ECPA Christian Book of the Year). Recently, Tish wrote a weekly newsletter for The New York Times and was a columnist for Christianity Today. Her articles and essays have appeared in Religion News Service, Christianity Today, Comment Magazine, The Point Magazine, and The New York Times. Please save the date for September 19th, 2024 at 6:30pm in the Hunter Welcome Center, when Tish will speak on Marriage as Formation. Tickets for this dinner event will go on sale in late July, so watch for more details.

The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) requires employers to file annual reports with the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Department of Labor on the status of their various employee benefit plans and to provide employees with a summary of those reports, called a Summary Annual Report. Here is the Full Report filed with the Internal Revenue Service for ACU’s group health plan. This report requires no action from you. It is for informational purposes only.

On August 20th, ACU’s campus will welcome our freshmen class and move in more than 900 students. Historically, this has been a day that the whole campus shows up to help move our new students into their residence halls. We rely on our Wildcat Week student leaders, and campus community to partner with ResLife to unload approximately 1700 vehicles. It’s an incredible day and one that unites our campus around the effort and excitement of starting a new academic year. Any and all move-in help on Aug. 20th is needed and appreciated. If you have a team or department that is planning to join for this day, please fill out this form and we will follow up with details about the move-in day process.

One of the great things about working at ACU is the amount of paid time off employees are given. For full-time employees in 2024, ACU will pay for 19 holidays and two personal days. Full-time employees also earn eight hours of sick leave per month, which is 96 hours per year. Full-time employees earn between 80 and 160 vacation hours annually, depending on how long they’ve worked at ACU. Between holidays, personal days and vacation, this is a minimum of 31 paid days off!

As July is coming to an end, please take a moment to look ahead and ensure you have appropriately scheduled your vacation and personal days with your supervisor. For 2024, personal days should be used by Dec. 20 and vacation balances over 80 hours must be used before Dec. 28.

ACU provides faculty, staff, students and alumni unlimited access to RightNow Media—the world’s largest streaming library of video Bible study resources? This extensive library has more than 20,000 videos and the Bible study videos can be used as part of a group study or personal devotions. Many series include free discussion guides and handouts.

RightNow Media is a tool that can help you live out your faith in every area of your life—at home, at work, and in your community. In addition to series on books of the Bible, RightNow Media has videos for everyone in your family on various topics like marriage, parenting, personal finances, mental health, and more. There’s even a library for kids with over 2,000 safe, entertaining videos. RightNow Media has a free app available on all major streaming devices so you and your family can access content anywhere, anytime.

To sign up, just visit this personal invite link.

From Bob Goff, “Has anyone ever told you you have permission to eliminate distractions! You have permission to live a more fulfilling life! Distractions cause more harm than you might think. And they’re all around us, all the time. They can disrupt our focus on what really matters, interfere with our true priorities, and divert our attention from the God who created us for his good purpose.”

Bob Goff, bestselling author of Love Does, has created this video Bible study to give you guidance in and joyful permission to:

• Identify the distractions in your life

• Eliminate them so that you can recharge and refocus on your God-given purpose

• Start living a less-distracted and more joy-filled and love-oriented life

Distractions can get you stuck in the past, worried about the present, and frazzled by any future you could possibly fret over. It’s time to discover how to get undistracted in all aspects of your life.

Come out on August 27th at 11:30 to the outdoor pickleball courts to celebrate the dedication of “Center Court” to Dr. Joyce Curtis. The retired Kinesiology professor and H.O.F. coach was responsible for introducing pickleball to our campus back in 1984. There will be pickleball-themed cookies and a revealing of the bronze plaque.