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2009 Fall Convocation Speech - Introduction and Appreciation

Speech Segments

  1. Introduction and Appreciation
  2. Achievements: Year in Review
  3. Furloughs
  4. Quick Wins
  5. Diversity
  6. Community Needs
  7. Organizational Structure
  8. Growth
  9. Planning and Vision
  10. Cofrin Gift
  11. Budget Recovery
  12. Conclusion

Fall 2009 Convocation Video

‘Introduction and Appreciation’ Video Transcript

Thank you.

My wife Cathy is here, and she has not been introduced. I’d like for her to stand. Cathy… there she is… Cathy and I thank you for the warm welcome we have experienced since coming to Green Bay. The welcome that we have received to your University is really gratifying. We are thrilled to be here.

We welcome you here to this new and academic year and, Professor Abbott, thank you for being the emcee this morning. A tough act to follow. I didn’t know you were going to give such a great speech. Very good. I have already forgotten your Latin, though, so I’m going to have to get a refresher course.

But I’m really pleased to have the opportunity to make some remarks.

I’m also delighted to add my personal congratulations to each of the Founders Awards. What am impressive group. I’m so proud of each one of you. Carol, Brian, Mike, Andy, Kim, Derek, and the cast and crew and other contributors to the Balkan Women. What a great, great story you all have and a great example you have set for the rest of us. Thank you all for your service to this University.

I’m also delighted to note that today we made a contribution that was truly one for the record books. Professor Andy Kersten, in 2007, he won the Founders Award for Teaching. In 2008, the Scholarship Award. And in 2009, today, the Award for Community Outreach. That’s pretty impressive, three years in a row.

As a matter of fact, that’s a first for UW-Green Bay. Three majors in a row… in tennis we have the Grand Slam, in golf we have the Tiger Slam, here at UWGB, I guess we’ll now have to call this the Andy Slam.

Also making this special is that Andy grew up on this campus. Many of you know Andy and his mother and father, Fred and Raquel, were long time faculty members here and Founders Award winners themselves.

Incidentally, he becomes the second UWGB professor to have received at least three Founders Awards. The other individual actually has received four. Do you know who that is? Cliff, do you know who that is? It’s Professor Cliff Abbott. I’m really thrilled to be on the platform with Cliff and the other individuals up here.

Maybe it’s Baby Boomer nostalgia, I don’t know, but it seems like lately we’re hearing a lot of 40-year anniversary kinds of things. We’ve got the moon landing, Woodstock – how many of you went to Woodstock? The Beatles’ Abby Road album, which I know because I loved the Beatles back then, that was their last album before they broke up. Civil Rights, you know, not exactly the 40th anniversary, but a lot happened in ’69 with Civil Rights. The Stonewall Riots, various Vietnam and anti-war activities that were going on at that time.

But here’s another one. Here’s another 40th anniversary-type of announcement. The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. Next Wednesday, it will be precisely 40 years since Sept. 2, 1969, when this University opened its doors on this site and started teaching students here.

Now there’s an interesting photo that I think is still on our website, and it’s of Chancellor Weidner shoveling mud away from the doors and the walkways on that opening day because, I guess we had a lot of rain and we were still under construction at that point in time. (Photo No. 50 at http://www.uwgb.edu/weidnertributes/slideshow/).

Later this academic year, we will be able to reflect back on the first Earth Day celebration in 1970, and the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay’s first commencement, which was June 1, 1970. Those things are happening this year.

We have a great past. We have so much to be proud of and so much work has been accomplished here. Over a 40-year span, it really is spectacular to me. I’m coming from a university that is exactly the same age. And it did a lot of work, too, but I’m telling you, if I had to stack the two up, we’re much further along in a 40-year history, and that really is a tribute to the founders, the early people here who put this together, who had some great ideas, and those of you who have been around here for a long time and the work you have done.

But we have a great year ahead of us, too. I understand it’s sort of customary for the chancellor to do a year-in-review at this event, and I’m going to do that. I have some highlights that I want to point out. And I have to also say that, I didn’t do any of these. I wasn’t here to even experience them, so much of this I will be reading because I know about them now, but I wasn’t here to personally or first-hand experience, or even contribute to it. But I am certainly impressed and really want to credit all of you for so much good work over this past year.

I think it’s important to recognize the exceedingly capable leadership of Interim Chancellor David Ward and Interim Provost Bill Laatsch. I say lotch, some people say “latch.” I asked him one day, and I think he told me lotch, but everybody else says “latch.” But I call him Bill Laatsch.

Dave Ward is here. Dave, would you stand. I haven’t had a chance to talk to you, but I’m so pleased to have you here. Dave was an exemplary chancellor over the past year or so. And, he was certainly not merely a caretaker. He could have come in here and kept things going and kept the lights on and so on. But he really moved the agenda, and that made it so much better for me because we didn’t lose any momentum. There’s good inertia here.

On top of that, he’s been a great help, personally, to me, and I consider him a really good friend now. So I really value what Dave has done.

Bill Laatsch, “latch,” you know the story. He was here for years; 41, 42 years, I’m not sure which is the right number, but years as a great professor. He retired, and immediately was called back by the University to serve his institution as interim provost, and he did so with distinction. He even let me live in his condo for a month while I was transitioning. Now how nice could that be? But that’s the kind of guy he is.

It’s truly remarkable the way this University has sustained its forward momentum during a year of such significant change, challenges and transitions. And we’ve truly had all of those. Congratulations. We’ve worked through them. You’re still doing great work. We’re teaching wonderful students, and we’re going to do a great job again at doing that.

I also want to state, in addition to Bill’s and Dave’s leadership, I want to recognize former Chancellor Bruce Shepard. He served this institution very well, also. Cathy and I have gotten to know Bruce and Cyndie over the last few months, and we are pleased to call them friends, as well. I think they’re going to be here late October for my investiture. I’m really pleased he’s interested in coming back. I’ve already seen Cyndie here a couple times with Ginny Riopelle, doing the Phuture Phoenix kinds of things.