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Prepared Remarks Easy-to-Print
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Speech to the University Senate
January 16, 2003
Ed Ray
Executive Vice President and Provost
The Ohio State University
Letting Go to Reach our Goals
Much has changed since I last spoke formally to the Senate just
over a
year ago. At that time I noted that much had changed from the time
before, which
in the words of a Chinese curse would suggest that we are living
in interesting
times. Cursed or blessed, we have faced many changes in the last
year and our
fortunes as an institution going forward will rest upon our ability
to create as well
as adapt to change.
My purpose in coming before you today is briefly to mark the significant
changes that have occurred, to recognize the challenges we face,
and to discuss
specific actions we must take this year to continue to create one
of the world's
truly great universities for the people of Ohio, and for the broader
community that
we serve.
Changed Circumstances:
All of us were taken by surprise last March at the sudden realization
that
Brit Kirwan would return to Maryland but heartened by the speed
with which the
Board of Trustees identified an outstanding new leader for this
University. The
hard work that many of you contributed to our effort to articulate
our purpose,
plans, and aspirations in the Academic Plan and the Diversity Action
Plan was
important in helping the University convince a scholar of the talent
and vision of
Karen Holbrook to accept the presidency at Ohio State. The President
has
moved quickly and diligently in the three months that she has been
with us to
understand and take charge of the many challenges that we face.
She has done
so with unmatched energy, intelligence, and graciousness. As more
of you have
the opportunity to get to know President Holbrook you will share
my certainty that
it is our great good fortune that she is now with us.
Joan Herbers has joined us as Dean of the College of Biological
Sciences
and Karen Bell has assumed the position of Dean of the College of
the Arts. Both
are accomplished scholars, experienced administrators, and up to
the challenges
they face. Change in leadership is also underway in five other units.
As they step
down at the end of this academic year, we express deep gratitude
to Dean John
Cassady, College of Pharmacy, and Dean Bob Gold, College of Mathematical
and Physical Sciences, for the strong, long-term leadership that
each has given
to his college. And we are in the unenviable position of needing
to replace the
academic leaders in three of our four regional campuses. Deans Violet
Meek
(OSU-Lima) and John Riedl (OSU-Mansfield) are retiring after more
than a
decade of strong leadership on their campuses, and Dean Dominic
Dottavio
(OSU-Marion) will leave us to become President of Heidelberg College.
I cannot
overstate the exceptional roles these three Deans have played in
enhancing the
academic mission and helping shape the future of The Ohio State
University on
their campuses. The University has indeed been fortunate to have
the quality of
leadership these five Deans have demonstrated.
Recently we learned that our Vice President for Development, Jerry
May,
will be leaving us after more than 10 years of extraordinary service.
His
leadership in our development efforts went well beyond the remarkable
feat of
raising $1.23 billion during the Affirm Thy Friendship Campaign.
Jerry worked
exceptionally well with all of the academic leaders of the University
and our
academic leaders will be challenged to continue to work as effectively
with our
new vice president. For Jerry, the task at hand was never simply
to raise money
but rather to help us build a truly great University. We thank Jerry
for that
outstanding leadership.
We have been blessed, too, in having among us a colleague and alumnus
who has helped us give voice to our hopes and dreams in the best
and worst of
times. I speak of course of David Citino, who has been recognized
as the first
Poet Laureate of The Ohio State University. Many other colleagues
have
received national and international recognition for their professional
accomplishments and brought honor to this University. Some examples
are
Janice Kiecolt-Glaser from Psychology and Psychiatry and William
Saam from
Physics who have been named Fellows of the American Association
for the
Advancement of Science. Winston Ho from Chemical Engineering has
been
elected to the National Academy of Engineering. Dale VanKley from
History was
recognized as a National Humanities Center Scholar. Barbara Groseclose
from
Art History was selected as a Fulbright American Scholar. Heather
Allen from
Chemistry received an NSF CAREER Award. And there are so many others
in
every college who distinguish this university through their scholarship
and
leadership.
Even with regard to budget matters, there has been, at least, an
absence
of bad news. There have been no additional cuts following the state
budget cuts
of October 2001. Our new budget process has been implemented without
too
many significant issues, and we were able to provide compensation
increases for
FY03 that were, perhaps, 2% or more above the average percentage
compensation increases for our benchmark peers.
While there may be some solace in recounting our relative good
fortune in
relatively unfavorable times, it is important not to minimize the
challenges and
opportunities we continue to face and to identify actions we must
take, whether
university-wide or in particular groups. Let me first speak of our
common
university-wide challenges.
Common Challenges:
All of our academic and support programs have been challenged to
operate effectively and plan responsibly given the budget cuts of
FY02 and
continuing uncertainties about state funding. But, we should do
this under any
circumstances. There seems to be a consensus that, at best, the
state share of
instruction will be flat or grow modestly for the next biennium
and that there may
be some form of tuition caps imposed for higher education. Our commitment
to
continue to make progress in providing our faculty and staff with
competitive
compensation, and on other goals of the Academic Plan will surely
require units
to again reallocate a few percent of their existing budgets and
to make difficult
program and staffing decisions.
Fortunately, our new budget process provides incentives for programs
to
be innovative and cost effective. It is fortunate, too, that we
continue to view the
budget as only a tool and not an end in itself. Most importantly,
we have the
Academic Plan to guide us in the pursuit of our mission even when
financial
expediency might draw us off in a different direction.
The Academic Plan and the Diversity Action Plan provide vital
guidance.
We must retain and recruit the best faculty and staff and develop
exceptional
academic programs. To do so, we are sustaining an aggressive strategy
to
increase the competitiveness of our faculty and staff compensation.
We are
pursuing efforts to rapidly expand our research facilities. We are
developing
plans to better meet the work/life needs of faculty and staff. We
are continuing to
meet our strategic investment commitments and to re-base budgets.
And, we are
pursuing implementation of the one University model for Columbus
and the
regional campuses.
We must continue to improve the quality of the teaching and learning
experience for our students both inside and outside the classroom.
We are doing
that through classroom and academic facilities upgrades and construction,
through year-round competitive undergraduate admissions, through
improved
academic and support services from Undergraduate Studies and Student
Affairs,
through increased funding for financial aid, scholarships and graduate
fellowships, through efforts to enhance faculty-student interactions
with
classroom, service learning, and research opportunities, and through
improved
teaching preparation programs, compensation, and benefits for graduate
teaching assistants.
We must continue to implement the Diversity Action Plan if we are
to
realize our aspiration to become a more richly diverse community.
We are doing
that through the efforts of all of the colleges and support units,
with guidance
from the Council on Diversity, through the work of The Women's Place,
the
President's Council on Women's Issues, the Multicultural Center,
the Office of
Minority Affairs, the Hale Black Cultural Center, through numerous
initiatives
among the student governments and the Office of Student Affairs,
and through
existing and new academic programs including African American and
African
Studies, Women's Studies, American Sign Language courses, Asian
American
Studies, Latino/a Studies, Disability Studies, Sexuality Studies,
and Native
American Studies, and the new Kirwan Institute for the Study of
Race and
Ethnicity in the Americas.
We must continue to reach out to the communities we serve, particularly
with regard to the needs of primary and secondary education and
to strategic
partnerships with the government and business sectors. We are doing
that
through our support for the Ohio Principals' Leadership Academy,
our
participation in the Ohio Reads Program, our co-leadership of the
Ohio
Collaborative for Accountability, and through expansion of activity
on the Science
and Technology Campus, our Homeland Security partnership with Battelle,
increased funding for our office for licensing and technology transfer,
and through
the continuing exceptional work of the Ohio State University Extension
Service.
Common Cause and Distributed Challenges:
While the challenges I have described are significant, they are
challenges
that we do have plans and strategies to address and we have a common
stake in
working together to deal with them effectively. But, some other
challenges are
more critical to the success of certain academic units than to others.
These are
challenges that will require a strong consensus and prudent leadership
at the
local level and a greater degree of institutional flexibility than
we have
demonstrated in the past at Ohio State. Ultimately, our ability
to solve problems
that affect some parts of the University more than others is no
less critical to our
success in implementing the Academic Plan, and perhaps harder to
manage,
than our ability to solve common problems. Our success will often
hinge on how
well the entire university community will support these local solutions.
Currently, examples of more localized challenges include the need
for
flexibility in staffing to meet critical needs within individual
colleges such as Law,
Business, Engineering, and Medicine and Public Health and the need
for
changes in working relationships among the colleges of the arts
and sciences to
enhance the quality and standing of our arts and sciences programs
and to
develop new and innovative programs.
For the remainder of my time today I wish to describe actions that
I believe
we must take now to effectively address both the common and the
distributed
challenges we face in the next few years. Let me begin by describing
specific
actions to meet our common challenges.
Setting the Course for Academic Investments:
Throughout the discussion of possible changes in the budget process,
Bill
Shkurti and I have repeatedly said that the budget process is simply
a tool that
should support our ability to implement the Academic Plan. And,
throughout that
discussion, colleagues have correctly expressed concerns that a
distributed
budget process will promote a silo mentality and undercut support
for academic
initiatives that serve broader institutional needs such as the Honors
and Scholars
Program, interdisciplinary courses, faculty hires and research,
and support for
student services. So, while the implementation of the new budget
process has
proceeded rather smoothly compared to other universities and implementation
details are continuing to be addressed, I want to share with you
my plans for the
use of strategic investment funds to enhance our common interests.
During the three years of budget cuts during the mid-1990s colleagues
repeatedly urged the University to develop initiatives that would
allow us to invest
in the future, to continue to build toward excellence in strategic
areas, even as
we generally made budget cuts to meet financial needs. The new budget
process
is designed to include central investment funds to permit us to
invest and to
maintain existing strategic commitments despite adverse financial
conditions. In
fact, we have earmarked more than $3 million in continuing funds
per year for
each of the next several years to meet existing commitments to budget
re-
basing, selective investment, and other strategic initiatives. That
is one example
of our resolve to manage resources in support of the Academic Plan.
During this first year of implementation of the new budget, we
must
demonstrate that we can and will make new collective investments
that provide
benefits broadly across the University. In a sense, how we address
collective
academic needs in this first year of the new budget process will
serve as an
example for years to follow. With that in mind, I am announcing
today that the
Office of Academic Affairs is allocating $1 million in continuing
funds available
from existing central strategic investment reserves to support five
initiatives with
strong implications for our Academic Plan:
- One, to provide the Honors and Scholars Program with faculty
and staff
support for the Collegium project, the undergraduate research
forum, and
additional honors course offerings in key areas;
- Two, to support the continuation of a departmental teaching
award
program as a tangible link between our effort to enhance academic
program excellence and the learning experience of our students
as called
for in the Academic Plan;
- Three, to substantially increase the discretionary budget that
the Council
of Graduate Students and the Inter-Professional Council have available
annually to support graduate and professional student research,
travel,
and program needs;
- Four, to provide funding for the enhanced training of teaching
assistants
through collaborative efforts of the Office of Faculty and T.A.
Development
and the departments;
- And five, to support additional competitively awarded fellowships
for
outstanding graduate students, minority mentoring programs, and
recruitment visit funds for fellowship candidates through the
Graduate
School.
While the specifics of these allocations and associated guidelines
will be
transmitted to affected units within the next week, the point I
want to emphasize
here is that we do have the flexibility, even in these difficult
times, within the new
budget process, to direct resources across the University in support
of the
Academic Plan.
Letting Go to Hold On:
As important and difficult as it is to make real financial commitments
to
collective needs in our current economic circumstances, we at Ohio
State, along
with all major public teaching and research universities, are being
challenged
even more severely to demonstrate that we can respond to differential
competitive market conditions among our colleges, departments, and
programs. I
assure you that there are at least 20 public teaching and research
universities
that aspire to be among the top 10 public universities in the country.
So,
expressing the goal by no means assures success. The institutions
that will
succeed will be those universities that recognize that the challenges
to achieving
excellence are different for different academic programs and, therefore,
provide
the flexibility for all of their colleges, departments, and programs
to compete most
effectively in their respective academic markets.
Last year, approval was given to the College of Medicine and Public
Health to extend the probationary period for regular tenure track
faculty with
clinical patient care responsibilities in order to better align
its practices with
almost all of the top 50 academic medical programs in the country.
While the
debate that followed resulted in a rules change that would permit
such proposals
to be deliberated under less contentious circumstances in the future,
it remains to
be seen if collectively we have learned the larger lesson as an
institution that to achieve academic excellence across the university
we will have to accommodate
a greater degree of local diversity with respect to personnel and
other matters.
Our ability to adapt to diverse needs to pursue excellence across
the
University has been tested again today as we considered a request
from the
College of Medicine and Public Health to make changes for regular
clinical
faculty. I urge you to consider seriously other requests as they
come forward
later this year from one or more colleges outside the health sciences
regarding
the ability to make regular clinical faculty appointments. It is
encouraging to see
the regular and engaged effort that Senate leaders and college representatives
have made to ensure that the proposal before you provides the needed
relief for
the college and, at the same time, provides for appropriate safeguards
for parts
of the University that do not want to make such changes, given the
academic
markets in which they compete to retain and recruit outstanding
faculty.
Subsequent requests from colleges outside of the health sciences
to be
able to make regular clinical faculty appointments will have to
stand on their own
merits. Enabling legislation exists and the Council on Academic
Affairs has been
working on guidelines to review such proposals. But, in considering
the requests
that do come forward, just as with the proposals from the College
of Medicine
and Public Health, the bigger challenge for all of us will be to
demonstrate that
we can find the proper balance between letting go of certain employment
and
administrative practices in some parts of the University while holding
on to
traditional policies elsewhere, consistent with the competitive
needs of all of our
programs.
Just as we are challenged to demonstrate that we can adopt personnel
practices that differ across the University to meet the needs of
different units, we
are also challenged to demonstrate that we are capable of making
administrative
changes that will best position our academic programs to achieve
excellence in
the future. At my urging, the Senate adopted new rules a couple
of years ago
that might have allowed for the elimination and merging of academic
units.
However, under these existing rules, I do not believe that we will
see any
programs eliminated or merged in the foreseeable future. Yet, I
continue to hope
that the example we are beginning to set to balance change and tradition
will
help future legislators to adopt more useful legislation.
Last year, I charged a committee to review the administrative structure
of
the colleges of the arts and sciences and to provide me with recommendations
regarding changes that might more effectively advance the role of
the arts and
sciences at this University. I said then and still believe that
our aspirations for this
University cannot be achieved if the arts and sciences are not in
a leading
position and that a substantial integration and enhancement of the
arts and
sciences programs is essential for them to realize their potential.
The ad-hoc committee provided me with a report in early October
and it
was distributed through the Senate to appropriate committees, through
the five
Deans of the Arts and Sciences to faculty and staff colleagues and
to the other
colleges through the Council of Deans. I held two open forums for
faculty and
staff in the arts and sciences and asked for all recommendations
by early
December. Before turning to the matter of next steps, I want to
express my
warmest personal thanks to Professors Edward Jennings, Joseph Ferrar,
David
Andrews, Katherine Borst Jones, Robert Gustafson, Barbara Hanawalt,
Rebecca
Jackson, Richard Petty, and Roy Stein, for their thoughtful proposal
and to
apologize to them for whatever grief they may have suffered from
colleagues for
responding to my request.
A number of colleagues and committees have urged me either to make
no
changes or to, at least, provide my own set of proposals for further
discussion
before any changes are implemented. I have told this body on earlier
occasions
that it is difficult to put an honest dialogue on a clock. I have
received many
suggestions but I am convinced that there does need to be further
discussion.
Colleagues need to hear from me regarding specific changes that
I believe
should be put in place, and then they need to have another chance
to provide me
with comments before actions are taken. Therefore, a written summary
of the
proposed changes will be distributed with this Senate speech and
I am asking for
comments by March 14th. With input from the feedback I get from
you and others
I will modify the administrative plan for the arts and sciences
and begin to
implement changes July 1, 2003.
I remain convinced that administrative changes are needed in the
arts and
sciences if they are to serve their appropriate central role in
the advancement of
this University. At present the whole remains less than the sum
of its parts
because of the balkanization of the administrative structure and
the consequent
lack of collaborative faculty teaching and research at the academic
heart of this
institution. Faculty and student teaching, learning, and research
opportunities
and the resources needed to sustain them are limited by top-heavy
administrative structures and artificial boundaries. The review
of the core
curriculum must continue in a less restrictive environment if we
are to build upon
the work of the recent GEC review committee, and we must enhance
our ability
to create new interdisciplinary programs for increasingly talented
and demanding
students and faculty colleagues, if the arts and sciences are to
be the intellectual
center of the University that is absolutely essential for us to
achieve the goals of
the Academic Plan.
While I urge you to read the brief document accompanying my speech
to get
the details, I would like to highlight some of the key features
of my plan.
-
The position of Executive Dean will become a separate position
from
those of the five Deans of the arts and sciences.
-
The Executive Dean will have delegated authority from the
Provost to
provide the Provost with input on promotion and tenure decisions
in the
five colleges. This will require a University Rules change.
-
The Executive Dean will review base budgets and re-basing
allocations for the colleges of the arts and sciences with the
Provost
annually, while responsibility for managing those budgets remains
with
the five Deans.
-
In addition to managing their separate college budgets, the
Deans will
also continue to send promotion and tenure dossiers directly
to my
office, until the rule change, referred to earlier, is enacted.
And, the
Deans will continue to serve on the Council of Deans and to
be
evaluated by the Provost in consultation with the Executive
Dean. The
Executive Dean or his/her designee will chair all searches for
new
Deans in the colleges of the arts and sciences.
-
Various arts and sciences programs and activities will be
overseen by
the Executive Dean, including the Arts and Sciences Honors and
Scholars Program, the University Press, the Undergraduate
International Studies Program, Arts and Sciences Advising and
counseling (in collaboration with USAS) and various interdisciplinary
programs, including American Sign Language, Latino/a Studies,
Asian
American Studies, Native American Studies, Disability Studies
and
others.
-
The Office of Academic Affairs will provide funding to cover
the
personnel and operating costs associated with the Office of
the
Executive Dean. The Office of Academic Affairs will provide
$500,000
in cash for each of the next three years to seed collaborative
curricular,
student service, and interdisciplinary research activities and
to assist
with interdisciplinary faculty hires and start up packages in
the five
colleges. The Executive Dean will have the charge to reduce
the
collective administrative costs at the college level in the
arts and
sciences by at least $500,000 in annual rate within the next
three
years. To the extent that administrative cost savings exceed
$500,000,
they will be matched by continuing funds from the Office of
Academic
Affairs up to another $500,000. All of the administrative cost
savings
and matching funds from my office will be used for faculty,
student
service, and program support within the arts and sciences.
-
Going forward, additional central investments in the arts
and sciences
colleges as a group will be channeled through the Office of
the
Executive Dean. And, there would be a 3% marginal tax on growth
in
tuition and the state share of instruction funds to the five
colleges to be
redistributed within the arts and sciences by the Executive
Dean in
consultation with the five Deans.
The final plans for going forward will be determined this spring.
The current
term of the Executive Dean, Michael Hogan, will be extended for
three years until
June 30, 2006. I will also meet with the faculty and staff of the
College of
Humanities for recommendations prior to appointing an Acting Dean,
to replace
Dean Hogan, in the College of Humanities, to serve from July 1,
2003.
Conclusion:
Let me summarize my main points. First, while we face substantial
financial challenges to date we have managed those challenges well
and we
have added valuable new leaders to our ranks to help us meet the
challenges
that lie ahead. We have implemented the new budget process smoothly.
Although it does create risks of non-cooperative behavior, I have
indicated some
continuing and new investments designed to reduce those risks. Despite
our
financial difficulties, we must send a clear message that we are
committed to
making central strategic investments needed to implement the Academic
Plan
and that the budget process is a tool we control in support of that
effort.
And finally, I have identified the challenge we face to be flexible
enough to
assist all of the parts of the university to pursue academic excellence
despite the
fact that the competitive environments within which they work may
be quite
different from one another. We are today and will continue to consider
changes in
personnel practices to meet special needs in some areas, and I have
described
administrative changes in the management of the arts and sciences
that I believe
will better serve our needs going forward.
View attachment: Executive
Dean of the Arts and Sciences
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