Anna Bialkowski
News Editor
Dr. Jeremy Martin is coming to the conclusion of his first academic year of presidency at FSC.
When Dr. Martin first became president at FSC, he made no immediate goals of change. Rather, Martin proactively made it his first step to know and understand the FSC community more deeply and profoundly. With a two major hurricanes hitting Central Florida within just a few weeks of his start, Martin faced a challenge.
“[Hurricane Milton] was both a learning experience to discover that and see how talented and good everyone is,” Martin said. “I was genuinely proud to how quickly the faculty adjusted.”
Martin explained that a great team at FSC before he arrived; his position as president ultimately comes down to put everyone in position to do their best work. However, Martin did not fully understand the capacity of this task.
“I don’t think I knew, before I was a college president myself, how daunting a task that is,” Martin said.
From these challenges, Martin says that he has developed an immense sense of gratitude and recognizes how rare it is to have a student body with such talent.
“I think that’s the biggest takeaway … to have a place where students of the talent that we draw have the character that they bring which is nurtured and further developed by the faculty and the staff that we have here,” Martin said.
“It is exceedingly rare. That’s more of my genuine takeaway from the year is more along the lines … how lucky I am that a group of trustees said, ‘hey, that guy gets a chance to lead this place.’ It’s a pretty remarkable thing to walk into.”
As Martin got to know the student body more, he developed a vision to further amplify community with more accessible gatherings for student groups. His first step? Hosting a dinner for students in his own backyard following this semester’s Town Hall. Whenever student groups of any kind — clubs, Greek organizations, friends — want to gather for a meal, Martin says he is “all about that.”
“I would love to bring events right in the center of campus and have students say to us, ‘We challenge you to allow us to a space where this volume of students can gather’ and we can serve food,” Martin said. “I’m confident [FSC] will rise to meet that challenge … all of those within that spirit of amplifying community.”
For event inquiries, Martin says the best place to reach out is to his email at jeremy@flsouthern.edu.
Looking forward into the next school year, Martin teases a restructure of the semesterly student assembly.
“We’re going to take an opportunity to actually gather and celebrate an aspect of our community. It’s previously been called convocation … we will likely call it convocation again,” Martin said. “I’m wildly optimistic about it and that we can do it.”
As the semester starts to wind down and come to a close, Martin wishes students a relaxing summer, saying that he does not know what he will do without seeing them on a daily basis.
“I will miss [students] terribly,” Martin said. “I was actually looking, like, I don’t know what we’re going to do … I will miss the students until they’re back.”
Martin plans on getting to know Lakeland with his family over the summer.
