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It took just 10 days — 10 days — for GCU to create a regional COVID-19 vaccination site, one unique in that it is the only point-of-dispensing site, or POD, in Maricopa County that offers a walk-through option. The goal is to administer between 800 to 1,000 vaccinations each day it is open to various community populations by appointment, depending on vaccine availability. “We’re doing it because this is part of our mission. This is part of our values to serve the community in this regard,” said Emergency Preparedness Manager Marcus Castle of the site, which opened today.

Chapel added another dynamic speaker Monday when Dan Steffen of Pure Heart Church visited for the first time to talk about how to get past being offended and turn those moments into your greatest blessings. “Your greatest adventure is on the other side of your most painful moments if you just trust God,” he said.

The near future will be a time of transition and hope, from a time dominated by a virus to one of helping each other, according to the priorities of three candidates for president of the Associated Students of Grand Canyon University. The election runs Wednesday through Friday, and Azul Pereyra, Havilah Houston and Darion Padilla will discuss their plans in a Meet the Candidates event at 5 p.m. Wednesday on the Quad.

Michael Potter, Assistant Professor in the Colangelo College of Business, focuses on all students when he teaches, not just the ones majoring in accounting. He aims to make it relatable by putting it in “understandable English that the students can better grasp.” When he’s not teaching, he’s exploring the glories of duct tape, Jack Reacher and a competitive card game called “Magic: The Gathering.”

GCU has partnered with Phoenix Rescue Mission in many ways over the years, from helping the nonprofit’s restaurant, Mission Possible Cafe, get off the ground, to the organization being a clinical rotation site for the University’s prelicensure nursing students, to GCU offering scholarships to those who have gone through the Rescue Mission’s Transformations Recovery Program. The latest partnership is the Lope Shop’s Give Back Get Back campaign, in which clothing, shoes and other items will be donated to the nonprofit. GCU’s work with Phoenix Rescue Mission was featured in the Community Relations Department’s latest Town Hall Informational.

College is all about learning experiences, and the Honors STEMists club took learning to the next level when its members built two wheelchairs and donated them to the Neighborhood Christian Clinic. Best of all, the Honors College students got to meet the family of a recipient. “It was just a very raw moment,” said one of the students, Abby Abraham. “They just kept saying, ‘You don’t understand how much this means to us.’”

Dr. Rachel Velarde made her return to singing last weekend at the Cal-Western Regional Conference of the National Association of Teachers of Singing. In her recorded performance, Velarde highlighted the classical music of several diverse women. “This is a women’s composer recital and deliberately programmed with people of color and also very contemporary music,” she said.

Dr. Patricia D’Urso of the College of Doctoral Studies is all about the data. “If you have collected valid and reliable data, it is hard to argue with the numbers,” she likes to say. But she also has a number of other interests, some of them extremely challenging. Find out the language she so desperately wants to learn.

What started out as a conversation at a meeting between Greg Harman, Assistant Vice President of Academic Alliances, and Dave Donaldson, co-founder of CityServe International, has turned into a something amazing — a partnership that led to GCU distributing 2,100 boxes of food to more than 20 community organizations as part of the USDA’s Farmers to Families Food Box Program. It was an achievement recognized at last week’s CityServe Virtual Celebration, which included not only Ivanka Trump, Advisor to the President, but Harman, who was a featured presenter.

Dr. Julia Langdal-Sittu teaches psychology in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences and has fun doing so. She makes it interesting and relatable for students by sharing her love of superheroes and having them do interesting exercises, such as the one that had her standing on a chair in GCBC and reciting a speech from “The Lord of the Rings” to the crowded room. And there’s more: She and her husband go on an annual excursion that is above and beyond, and she gets her kicks out of an aggressive exercise that she finds “exhilarating.”