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the progress – then I will conclude with selected challenges. No. 1 on that list: Our unique approach to preparing students, to preparing the future. How are we doing? • Notable progress, first, in how to capture and communicate what is distinctive about a UWGB education. We call it “connecting learning to life,” and that message is getting out. More students that ever want to attend UWGB. We closed earlier than ever and – I better whisper this given President-Designate Reilly’s presence – our enrollments this fall will be up somewhat from last Fall. We did try very hard to keep them down but higher than expected transfer and yield rates on applications meant we missed that mark. Handling such demand is a subject I will return to. For now, the message is simple: people want the UWGB experience that you create. • I could go on about many other ways, last year, we gave meaning to connecting learning to life: educational trips to Italy or Ecuador, the interdisciplinarity in action series, having all four major Democratic presidential candidates on our campus; the academic excellence symposium, faculty and staff together taking a play on death and dying and turning it into a rich interdisciplinary experience for campus and community, a new masters program – the Master’s of Social Work – in partnership with UW-Oshkosh, and a second record-breaking year for our new Master’s of Management. • But, there is another dimension to our unique academic approach that I don’t think we brag enough about: the ways we connect learning to life in our contributions as scholars: four quick examples among many illustrate: – The grant, with Congressman Mark Green’s leadership, to plan for a paper research and technology transfer center. – A major research project involving educators and their students in monitoring and researching non-point source water pollution. |
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– Another major research project in which UWGB involves
scholars and school districts in improving the teaching of American History. – And, of course, growth in the Space Grant program we are pleased to host for the state of Wisconsin, those dollars flowing, again, to improving K-12 education. I could go on and on but I hear Cyndie’s kitchen timer ticking. Still, note the theme running through every one of the examples: learning through practical, hands on, community-involved problem solving. Connecting Learning to Life and campus to community. It is happening. And happening, by the way, because everybody – faculty, residence life, facilities, IT Staff, you name it, everybody – is on board and essential to our success. Continuing the progress report: Partnerships • Partnerships are breaking out all over: with our UW and tech college counterparts through NEWERA; with St Norbert in two joint programs we initiated last year, both involving international education and scholarship UWGB is increasingly seen as a leader in pushing regional solutions, regional economic development. Green Bay’s University of Wisconsin • You have turned words into actions with a list, check the Web, of over 100 ways you are connecting campus and community. You started a speakers series – UWGB Downtown. We have established a physical presence downtown in the Washington Commons. I’m told it already has 400 hours of programming in place. And, I do want to mention, as must be the case in the current environment, that the facility is being done entirely on a self-support basis: no UWGB budget allocations are involved. Diversity • Enrollments and retention rates for students of color reached all-time highs last year. This Fall we can boast the largest ever number of new students of color. • To our excellent existing programs, you have also added the Phuture Phoenix Program, that builds a pipeline that goes back – as it must if we are to effectively reach kids whose parents have not gone to college – to the fifth grade. |
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Growth • We have demonstrated the need, developed the models that show how essential and how realistic the growth agenda is, and received strong vocal support from System leadership and legislative leadership. • We have maintained our commitment, also, to never cheat the students we currently serve by watering down the quality of existing programs. We will not do that. Our program growth, in this fiscal environment, has been limited to “cost recovery” programs, • And, we have made progress upon important facilities improvements: three new residence halls in three years, the essentially new LS building, the Union remodel and expansion, the Sports and Events Center, and the Studio Arts remodel. The notion that Communities support universities that support communities? Our strategy is working: • The state agreed to fund, in advance, a portion of the much-needed sports and event center expansion, something I was told would never happen in the current environment. It happened because UWGB is now seen as more than simply UWGB; we have friends, supporters, allies throughout the area, to be blunt about it, we are recognized as a force to be reckoned with. • The public is stepping forward to help. While we are still in the “quiet phase” of our fundraising, you should take pride in the fact that individuals and corporate entities have been making very generous commitments. • Additionally, last fall we celebrated our first fully endowed chair and are now recruiting to fill that position. • And, everywhere I go and in conversations ranging from the longtime Green Bay’r who cuts my hair to the legislative leadership in Madison and our Governor (who has sharp shears too), I do hear nothing but extraordinarily support for our current direction: connecting campus and community. |
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TOP OF PAGE Office of the Chancellor, David A Cofrin Library, Suite 810, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, 2420 Nicolet Drive, Green Bay, WI 54311-7001 Phone: 920-465-2207 E-mail: shepardb@uwgb.edu Comments to: Chancellor's Web Manager Revised: 03/02/2006 |