MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — Making sure students find their place at Middle Tennessee State University is the focus of the new vice president for student affairs and dean of students’ goal as he begins his first semester at the university.

Program host Andrew Oppmann, vice president for marketing and communications, spoke with James Bridgeforth on the September edition of MTSU’s television magazine program, “Out of the Blue,” to explain his role at the university and how he plans to make sure all students are set up for success.

“The dean of students is really critical because it’s really about helping students get connected in terms of support, well-being, making sure that they have all the things they need to be successful students in the classroom,” Bridgeforth explained.

Bridgeforth said one of the most important parts of his job is making sure that resources are available to students and that they find a place that feels like home.

“If students find a place where they feel like they belong, and they can be well and healthy, they’ll stay longer. We want them to find their people, find their place and find their passions,” he said.

Watch the full interview below.

In addition to fostering a strong sense of belonging, Bridgeforth is overseeing the Womack Commons housing project, which will provide 500 beds, a parking garage and state-of-the-art technology.

“MTSU is, right now, at a really exciting point,” he said. “We are working on our first residence hall that’s been built in 25 years.”

“Our students have said so many times that we need more housing. We want people to live on campus; we have 20,000 students. We’re a large campus, but most of our students don’t have the opportunity to live on campus, but they want to.”

Currently, MTSU has more than 200 registered student organizations on campus.

“If you think about it, the university is like a human body. It’s a thing that works every day, but the students are the lifeblood of it. The students coming in and out each year; each generation brings new ideas, new energy, and it keeps the university new and fresh, and it keeps going,” Bridgeforth said.

He continued, “The student experience for us is not just programming. We are strategic about creating experiences for students to become the person they want to be when they leave here.”

Ways to watch, listen

• “Out of the Blue” is available anytime on the university’s YouTube channel, the True Blue TV channel, Roku, Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV.

• It also airs on Murfreesboro cable Channel 9 daily at 6 a.m., 11 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.; Sundays; WKRN+ at 7 p.m. Thursdays and noon Sundays; WNPX “The Spot – Nashville 28” at 4:30 a.m. on Saturdays; and streamed on the MTSU Jazz Network through WMOT.org at 7 a.m. on the first Sunday of each month; and on other cable outlets in Middle Tennessee, so check local listings.

• It is also available as a podcast on iTunes and Google Play and as individual interview segments on Spotify at https://spoti.fi/453hxg3.

Watch previous episodes of “Out of the Blue” at https://mtsunews.com/out-of-the-blue.

— DeAnn Hays ([email protected])