“Questions of the Week” is part of a weekly series in which Daily reporter Nina Fox interviews a prominent person in the Iowa State and Ames communities. To make a suggestion for a possible person to interview, submit an e-mail request to www.feedback.daily.iastate.edu. This week’s interview is with Thomas Hill, vice president for Student Affairs.

What do you do as vice president for Student Affairs?

I’m responsible for the units and the divisions or the departments within the divisions of Student Affairs. There’s several: Department of Residence, the counseling center, Student Health Center, Dean of Students Office, Office of International Student Scholars, international talent search, Student Affairs, enrollment services and the Registrar’s Office.

How do you go about handling issues that arise?

The main thing we try to keep in mind is that we’re here to serve students. Students are what we’re all about, so whatever we do in anything we do, we try to do it with the students in mind and having students benefit from any activity. So we deal with situations, we try to make it a good learning experience for students.

There are a variety of things we keep in mind when dealing with students, and as we deal with any particular situation, we make an attempt to deal with it on its own merit and deal with it individually and not just try and lump things together.

What are your goals and aspirations not only for this year, but the years ahead?

Well, this year I think comes on the heels of a very active year. Last year was my first year [at ISU], and I think it was an opportunity for me to get acclimated to this campus. Although I wish I didn’t have the kind of hot topics to deal with during the first year.

The very first thing I had to deal with when I came here was the [suicide] in Friley Hall. So last year was a very active year and very busy, and it also was a year for me to try to get acclimated to Iowa State University, to the campus, to the students, administration and faculty.

This year, knowing a little more about Iowa State, I can focus in on things, and one of my main goals is to make the division of Student Affairs at Iowa State as strong as a division and as active as a division as I can possibly make it. I want people in the profession, when they talk about an exemplary Student Affairs program, I want them to mention Iowa State University as a program to look at or as a program to emulate.

What are some issues of the 1997-98 school year that you have dealt with?

There were several emergency issues that came up … car accidents, motorcycle accidents and have had a couple students die in their apartments. Anytime you deal with emergencies like those, you deal with family, the friends of the students, the classmates of the students, so those were some of the real high-profile situations that we dealt with.

How do your choices affect the students of Iowa State?

The things that we do obviously affect Iowa State, hopefully the choices that are made by the division of Student Affairs are good choices and are positive choices that will affect students in a positive way.

We try very hard to weigh students’ wants, desires and needs in decisions we make. And hopefully … the decisions we make in the Department of Student Affairs … affect the students in a very positive way.

And if not, we’ve got to do better because that’s the goal.

The goal is to make good decisions and to support students’ efforts, to get a good quality education and have good quality experiences while here at Iowa State University.

What have certain issues here at Iowa State taught you about Student Affairs?

Well, one of the most important things is “reinforce.” … We, the division of Student Affairs, must stay in touch with students. It is a reinforced matter where we are on an issue, if we’re on opposite sides on an issue … we always have to talk to each other. We always have to keep the lines of communication open and always maintain contact.

We can never afford … to be so opposed of each other that we don’t even talk to each other. We have to keep those lines of communication open, and I express this with everybody in the division. You cannot afford to let students drift away … and not meet those lines of communication. And it doesn’t mean just with those students who you have something in common with. It means [with] those students [who] are hard to get to know. We’ve got to get to know them because they are tuition-paying students, and they’re students of Iowa State University. They have every right [that] anybody else [has]. Just because they are not as vocal, we’ve got to know them as well … and maintain a good relationship, a good working relationship, [even though] a good relationship doesn’t always mean that you agree.

You could have a good relationship with your parents, but you don’t always agree. You always think your parents are crazy on certain issues, but they’re still your parents and you have that relationship. We have to have that communication, not to say that Student Affairs are like parents, but the relationship is very similar.

What are your expectations for Veishea 1999?

I expect to have an even better Veishea in ’99 than we had in ’98. I’m very proud of the student body. They did an outstanding job last year. If you look at what happened around the country last year, other universities really struggled with those spring celebrations: Michigan State, Washington State, Miami of Ohio. There are a number of institutions that had riots and blow-ups with those springtime celebrations.

You look at Veishea, and you don’t get any bigger or any stronger than Veishea, and the students decided that they were going to have a good celebration. They made that happen. So that’s proof to me that if the students decide they’re going to do something, they’ll get it done.

We’re looking forward to an outstanding celebration for 1999. Matter of fact, I’m looking forward to a bigger and better [celebration] because we had a limited time for Veishea ’98, and it was a success. It was an unqualified success.

I heard you went to the Olympics a few years back. Tell me about your experience there and what event you participated in?

I went to the Munich Olympics in 1972 [and participated] in the 110-meter high hurdle. It was an excellent experience for me. It also was the Olympic Game where the Arab and Israelis had a conflict and what happened was there were some Arabs who stormed the Olympic Village and killed some Israeli athletes … so those games were marred by that particular event. I was a recently graduated college student and had just completed my degree in May ’72. I got commissioned in the army in May of ’72 and made the Olympics in June of ’72. I also got married in ’72 … so ’72 was a big year for me, but a really good experience. It was pretty exciting in both good and bad ways and pretty interesting.