"Intermezzo"

It is an honor to be with you again, albeit temporarily. In one sense all presidents are interim. Luckily for you, my remarks are only an intermezzo, not an overture. To me the word “interim” suggests the years between 1981 and now, which could metaphorically make me a set of bookends for a period during which the University has made great strides.

I want to express our collective appreciation for the stellar leadership of Mary Sue Coleman. She is a person of vision, action, energy, and commitment. She leaves an enduring legacy of achievement upon which we can continue to build.

In searching for a worthy successor, we are blessed that the Board of Regents continues its policy of constituting a campus-based Presidential Screening Committee. We are fortunate to have a board that is a strong advocate for its universities and at the same time practices oversight rather than management of institutional affairs. The board also wisely recognizes the importance of institutional individuality and supports excellence.

Excellence builds on momentum. Time is always of the essence. We cannot afford to mark time during the presidential search. So I view our brief encounter as a time to continue moving forward, even as we leave open opportunities for a new president to help us seize.

Briefly, I want to make a few general remarks about my perception of the character of our university and then speak to immediate challenges.

As for my perceptions, the University far exceeds anything I could have imagined when I came here as an instructor 50 years ago. Even as it has trebled in numbers of faculty and students, however, its character remains much the same.

Iowa remains a university in an era of multiversities. We are both physically and intellectually present in one place, decentralized yet integrated. The river runs through the campus. It does not divide us. At our core are the arts, humanities, and sciences, surrounded by well integrated professional programs. The value of the basic disciplines lies in their continuing exploration of content and context. The professions depend on this exploration for their vigor, and the basic disciplines more fully serve society through their application by the professions. They are linked and they are interlinked.

Recognizing the importance of content to advanced instruction at both the undergraduate and graduate level, we have increasingly stressed the importance of research. I remember being stunned by the relative lack of research cited in the first set of promotions I saw as dean of faculties. That has been redressed in the years since. The quality of our instruction and research has greatly advanced even as it has markedly changed and expanded.

In the past 50 years, undergraduate education nationwide has changed dramatically. General education or liberal studies has been caught between a specialty-minded faculty and a career-oriented student body. There remains an important role for cross-disciplinary endeavors. For those who are committed to the demands of interdisciplinary work, we want to provide administrative procedures conducive to their efforts. A rigorous and broadly defined humanities and social sciences program at the University of Minnesota in the 1940s has had an enduring impact on my life, particularly on my career. After all, life is a cultural experience, and we need insight into ourselves and our living together.

Since I teach undergraduates, I want to have an overall objective beyond course content. Here I am influenced by Virgil Hancher’s remarks before a general session of the North Central Association in 1944. President Hancher asserted that every student should possess at graduation:

(1) minimum body of basic and fundamental knowledge . . . ; (2) skill in handling source materials and in adding to one’s previously acquired body of knowledge; (3) the ability to think, analyze and act in the presence of new or unprecedented situations; and (4) an ethical attitude toward the uses to which one may put his or her knowledge and skill.

And what is more fundamental and timely than ethics, including our own? In the 1970s, the University adopted a general ethics statement, which has been augmented in successive decades. We owe it to ourselves and our constituencies to reexamine our ethical codes. We need to be sure that ethics courses are available to all of our students. In doing so, we must underscore that ethics are based on attitudes, values, and beliefs. Ethics are about our relationships with others.

We need always to act affirmatively with respect to others. Early in the civil rights movement, the University moved beyond the issue of improper discrimination to an affirmative policy of inclusiveness and diversity. That policy remains central to our pursuit of educational excellence.

Turning to immediate challenges, they fall into two related categories: increasing our funding and strengthening our statewide connections.

Funding: Our financial operational core is the state appropriation. The overwhelming number of our faculty who teach our students is paid from the General Education Fund. As a result of state budget cuts, which have reduced faculty size, we do not have enough classes and many are too large. Faculty members are being recruited away with higher salaries. Our library acquisition and operational funds are suffering, as is our informational technology capacity.

To redress these serious deficiencies, tuition increases should not be looked to as the principal source of meeting budget shortfalls. Rapidly rising tuition is a subject of national concern for public university students. In the past 22 years, the percentage of state appropriations in our General Education Fund has decreased from 73.5 percent to 52 percent and the percentage of tuition dollars has risen from 19 percent to 38 percent.

Historically, in bad times as well as good, Iowa has steadfastly supported tuition-accessible Regents universities. We have a major responsibility to demonstrate that now—more than ever—the Regents universities are crucial to the future well-being of Iowa and constitute a wise investment of public funds.

At the same time, we must significantly increase private support. When the University of Iowa Foundation was established in 1955, it raised $25,000 the first year. In the years since, the foundation has raised a total of $755,462,519. Now we are seeking $850,000,000 for endowment, special projects, and capital improvements. The success of this major campaign depends in part on our own giving. By participating, we set a compelling example for our alumni and friends to participate.

Just as private giving has grown dramatically in the past 50 years, so has income from grants and contracts, largely from federal sources. Here again the contrast is extraordinary. In 1966-67, the first year of records, faculty investigators earned $19.9 million and in 2001-2002 they earned $341 million. This funding is principally research-restricted with some targeted for instruction and public service.

A significant amount of private and grant funding goes for building construction and renovation. Space has always been inadequate at Iowa. It is astonishing that this university had no freestanding library building until the first phase of the current general library was built in 1951. State construction support now comes from the tobacco settlement. If we do not avail ourselves of these funds, they will be used elsewhere. Space is essential to our mission. Because its funding comes from a variety of restricted one-time sources, we can and we must address limited space needs in a time of state operational budget stringencies.

State connections: To secure the funds needed for the University to be outstanding, we must underscore our connections with the state at large. In 1903, Thomas Macbride delivered 60 extension lectures in 50 weeks. On a slow train returning from a lecture trip in western Iowa, a traveling man seated beside him asked Macbride his occupation. He answered, “A traveling man.” “But of what?” he was asked. “Of notions,” he responded.

Our principal service to the state is teaching and research. Yet those of us engaged in statewide outreach need to examine how we can do so more collaboratively in order to expand our effectiveness and reach. We need to be active in all areas of the state. We also need to devise more concerted ways in which some of us can be even more helpful in advancing Iowa’s long-term economic development.

A vibrant University depends on a vibrant Iowa. A vibrant Iowa depends on a vibrant University. We need to make the case for increased state support through a strategic advocacy program that enlists alumni, parents, and friends throughout the state. We need to reverse in Iowa the national trend to reduce state expenditures and increase tuition. Student access is a core premise of state universities. Given the economic circumstances of these times in Iowa, this will not bring immediate results. But we must accelerate our efforts now to accomplish our goal in the next four years. Outreach and advocacy are the themes of my administrative intermezzo.

Finally, I want to salute the colleagues of my generation. Their commitment to the University remains steadfast. Our retired faculty and staff colleagues comprise a continuing resource crucial to our institution’s greatness. Hundreds of them continue work in their fields, continue teaching, and continue to volunteer generously in our hospitals and clinics and throughout our campus community. The Gray Hawks and the Emeritus Faculty Association are brokers of retiree volunteerism. I urge all of us to enlist their time, energy, and experience throughout the University.

Regardless of our age, we all know from experience that excellence must be the University’s overarching goal. Collective excellence depends on individual excellence. Outstanding people make a university great. The excellence of the University depends on each of us. Each of us has a personal responsibility to excel. Excellence waits for no one, no times. Some of our best-known programs nationally came about in tough economic times. And we have never been more productive than in these times. The frontier is never an easy place to be, but President Jessup challenged us for all times when he said, “Education is Iowa’s never-ending frontier.”

Thank you for all you do in so many different ways to advance our university in times of challenge.