|
|
2006
Faculty and Staff CONVOCATION |
| REAFFIRMING OUR STRATEGIES AND PRIORITES |
|
|
|
 |
A busy summer, indeed. And, we have a busy year ahead. A year in
which we begin building the “next UWGB.” But, before looking
into that future, let’s reaffirm what we are about: our priorities
and our strategies for advancing them. What are we about? In my own mind, it is simple: to be Green Bay’s University of Wisconsin. But, that simple phrase rests about several central priorities: • To offer high quality undergraduate programs to promising students, largely from our region, the vast majority of whom remain in our area upon graduation. • To continue to hold at our center and as the special opportunity we offer to these students, the distinguishing feature of UWGB education: interdisciplinarity. Practical hands-on learning from multiple perspectives. • To offer exceptional graduate programs focused primarily on meeting the needs of our region but also, as with our premier program in Environmental Science and Policy, drawing to our region talented students from a broader area. • To serve and reflect the diversity that enriches our community. • Importantly and integral to being Green Bay’s University, we must be relentless in our efforts to connect the world to Green Bay and connect Green Bay to the world. • To be the place people think to come to for help be it involving public policy, artistic and fine arts fulfillment, business, lifelong learning, environmental sustainability, K-12 education, or whatever. These elements, have long defined UWGB’s mission. If you look at a region in transition, a state in transition, a world rapidly changing, I think it self-evident that these priorities are more relevant than ever. We are about connecting learning to life. Yet, changing environments call for changing strategies. Our tactics may change; I will argue they must change. But, when I turn to talk about the “next UWGB,” the priorities that have long guided us remain as central as ever. I also believe the strategy that we have been following in recent years will continue to serve us well. The strategy has many components but we summarize it in one simple phrase: communities support universities that support communities. Again, it is really just the “Wisconsin Idea” become the “Northeastern Wisconsin Idea.” I would go further and assert that, here in Northeastern Wisconsin, we are making an actual reality of a Wisconsin Idea that has too often become more revered symbol than fundamental organizing principle, particularly in recent years as various battles, confrontations, and pressures impinged and distracted. How are we living the Wisconsin Idea here in our region? Consider just a few examples added in the year past: • Our Hmong Studies Center will position us to better serve and understand the growing Hmong community. The center coordinates academic courses such as those in Hmong language, heritage and culture. We expect to add research seminars and campus and community events in the coming year. • This past spring, we took a leadership role in Brown County’s first Leadership Summit on Diversity. This event was a springboard for collaborative action on the important issue of the changing face of Brown County’s population. • We continued to work with our NEWERA partners in making our institutions more accessible to the region’s citizens. For example, a new library card – available at all NEWERA institutions – will make information freely available to all members of the communities we serve. • Through our International Social Justice symposium series, we brought together local and international experts to enhance the community’s understanding of land claims and indigenous rights. Our friends from the Oneida Nation added their unique perspective to this year’s event. • Our summer camps served our community well, often in innovative ways. Grandparents University brought together several generations for a meaningful learning and bonding experience. Our new camp for grieving children served a community need while also showcasing our students at their best. • Representatives of the campus and community came together for a dialog on the importance of a liberal education, sharing ideas on why higher education is an important tool in promoting civic involvement. • We continued to work with Mayor Jim Schmitt and other local leaders to promote the region’s economy through events and activities such as the Mayor’s Entrepreneur’s Connection. • Our students, faculty and staff reached beyond the physical comforts of Northeastern Wisconsin to assist victims of Hurricane Katrina one year ago. They donated money and, in some cases, their time and effort, to help hurricane victims get back on their feet. • You’ll be hearing about other excellent examples of how we’re living the Wisconsin Idea – often in a collaborative manner – when we announce our Founders Association Awards for Excellence later this morning. |
|
Communities
support universities that support communities. How about the effectiveness
of the strategy? Is the community supporting us? Consider several examples: Philanthropic giving continues to break records. I have reported that to you at each of the past three convocations but we are again beating the record-breaking year past by 10, 15, 25% in the various areas of giving and givers. I will spare you the detailed statistics this year because I want, instead, to talk people instead of numbers. Bernie and Sally Killoran are longtime friends of this university. Retired from K-12 teaching, they have remained heavily involved in education and in the day-to-day life of this campus. You have doubtless seen them at campus events. Last year, we had the honor of recognizing their quiet but unwavering commitment with the Chancellor’s Award. Scholarships have always been a priority for Bernie and Sally. They have supported scholarships financially and by taking a personal role in helping select awardees. Recently, they made a commitment to start making gifts to create an endowed scholarship fund for UWGB students. Then, we learned this summer, Sally and Bernie decided to give each other a special 50th wedding anniversary gift: rather than make the endowed scholarship commitment over a period of years, they made an endowment gift immediately so that the scholarships could start flowing this fall. A gift they were giving each other. A very special gift for us. I have asked our friends the Killorans to be here with us this morning. Bernie and Sally, would you please stand so that we might show our appreciation for your generosity. And, congratulations on your 50th wedding anniversary. Yes, communities support universities. Philanthropic support is key to maintaining a margin of excellence. Our state support is even more critical, though, and we must reverse its decline. The so-called Taxpayers Protection Act was looming large last year. Decline would have turned into disaster. Frankly, I tried to hide from you just how worried I was for I had seen the devastation that such abandonment of the principles of representative and deliberative government had wrought in California and in Oregon. Had it passed the Wisconsin Legislature, its simplistic appeal meant almost certain approval by the electorate, and the resulting erosion in our state support would have been catastrophic. That it did not pass has a great deal to do with our community and community leaders, their desire not to see Green Bay’s University of Wisconsin decline, and their willingness to take public and sometimes politically courageous positions. In this, we owe thanks to many, including our own Council of Trustees composed of respected community leaders who placed key calls, the Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce and its President, Paul Jadin; the Press-Gazette and its thoughtful editorials; senators and alums Rob Cowles and Dave Hansen; and other local legislators who did important work in the Assembly: Judy Krawczyk, Karl Van Roy, and Tom Nelson. If you are like me, though, you are fed up with expending so much effort fighting simply to keep things from getting even worse. How about working to make things better? That is my third example of how effectively our community-centered strategy is working. Our region needs UWGB to grow. For four years, we have been building the components of a growth agenda and establishing the relationships necessary for its realization. Last April, we unveiled it during the Regents meeting on our campus. Let me correct myself. We did not unveil it. The community did. Last year, at opening convocation, I stated the rationale for growth. To the Regents, community leaders did so and with an effectiveness, passion, and sense of ownership far, far greater than anything we could have done. They stated the case: a region undergoing dramatic economic change; a region now thinking of itself as a region; a region undergoing critical demographic changes; high demand for UWGB graduates; high demand for access to UWGB, historically at the freshmen level and exploding at the transfer level; Wisconsin’s third largest metropolitan area with the UW’s third smallest campus; … And, importantly because having the facts in your favor is not sufficient, you must also create the political will to do what is necessary, these leaders all said that they would be with the Regents down in Madison fighting to make the growth agenda happen. And the impact was immediate. Regent President Walsh praised the agenda. Regent after regent sought the floor to express unconditional support for the agenda. Would that have happened were it just us doing the talking without the community behind us? Frankly, no. The entire System has come to see the wisdom in the course we began plotting and explaining to them over four years ago. The Growth Agenda is now the agenda for the entire system. |
|
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: 08/23/2006 |